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STUDIES 


IN   THE 


LATIN  OF  THE  MIDDLE  AGES 


AND   THE 


RENAISSANCE 


BY 


VICTOR   SELDEN    CLARK 

Fellcno  in  Latin,  Columbia  University 


Submitted    in    Partial    Fulfilment    of    the    Requirements    for    the 

Degree  of  Doctor  of  Philosophy  in  the  Faculty  of 

Philosophy,  Columbia  University 


Press  of 

The  New  Era  Printing  Company 

Lancaster,  Pa. 


Copyright,   1900 
By  victor   SELDEN   CLARK 


J, 


77Z 


CONTENTS. 


Part  One. — The  Latin  of  the  Middle  Ages. 

Classical  Latin  and  the  Sermo  Plebeius    .  -: I 

The  Vulgate  and  the  History  of  the  Franks 3 

The  Last  of  Spoken  Latin  among  the  Commons 13 

The  Carolingian  Revival ^7 

The  Waltharius  and  the  Troilus 23 

The  Latin  of  the  Chroniclers 33 

The  Latin  of  the  Schoolmen       35 

The  Goliard  Songs  and  the  Gesta  Romanorum 40 

The  Survival  of  Ancient  Culture  in  Italy 49 

Part  Two. — Latin  of  the  Renaissance. 

The  Latin  of  Dante .., 61 

Petrarch  and  the  Beginning  of  New  Latin 66 

Erasmus  and  Quasi-Vernacular  Latin 82 


8658;: 


•J.%fIVERSITT 


PART  ONE. 
THE  LATIN  OF  THE  MIDDLE  AGES. 

i. 

It  is  an  interesting  as  well  as  a  significant  fact  that  Latin,  the  language  that 
has  played  the  most  important  part  of  any  perhaps  in  the  history  of  the  civilized 
world,  has  during  almost  its  whole  literarj'  existence  been  the  language  of  a  class, 
holding  itself  aloof  from  the  household  tongue  of  the  common  people  even  when 
most  intimately  related  to  it.  At  the  very  time  of  its  greatest  degradation  it  was 
to  a  certain  extent  aristocratic  in  its  character,  its  traditions,  and  its  sympathies. 
This  fact  is  significant ;  for  upon  it  probably  depended  the  very  possibility  of 
Latin's  continuing  a  world  language.  No  form  of  speech  could  long  withstand  the 
discrete,  disintegrating  tendencies  of  the  commons,  though  it  might  continue  to 
serve  for  a  long  period  as  the  universal  tongue  of  the  narrower  sympathied,  but, 
from  the  point  of  view  of  nationality,  more  liberally  educated  classes.  It  is  no  ordi- 
nary phenomenon  that  this  language,  so  foreign  in  its  very  essence  to  modern  life, 
should  still  remain  the  touchstone  of  culture  through  all  the  enlightened  world.  If 
we  can  throw  though  it  be  but  a  partial  and  transient  light  upon  some  of  the  features 
of  its  genesis  and  history  that  help  to  explain  this  fact,  the  object  of  the  present 
writer  will  have  been  attained. 

The  literary  language  of  Rome  at  the  time  of  Cicero  and  Augustus  was  a  culti- 
vated variety  of  the  Roman  dialect  of  Latin.  It  represented  the  result  of  a  process 
of  differentiation  that  had  been  going  on  for  over  two  centuries,  separating  the  orig- 
inally homogeneous  speech  into  a  cultivated  and  a  vulgar  dialect,^  a  process  that 
had  been  hastened  and  emphasized  by  the  introduction  of  Greek  culture  at  Rome, 
and  by  the  political  importance  which  the  conquests  of  Rome's  generals  had  given 
to  her  language  in  the  legal  and  administrative  world. 

As  such,  the  literary  idiom  of  Rome  must  be  distinguished  from  the  dialect  of 
the  Roman  commons  on  the  one  hand,  and  from  the  rustic  dialects — of  the  same 
Italic  stock,  but  more  remotely  related  to  it — on  the  other.     This  fact,  that  liter- 
ary Latin  stood  in  a  different  relation  to  the  language  of  the  people  at  large  than 
our  own  cultivated  English  does  to  the  colloquial  English  of  the  streets,  must  be 
kept  in  mind  not  only  in  considering  the  development  of  Latin  during  the  pe 
when  it  was,  in  the  conventional  sense  of  the  word,  a  living  language  underst 
by  the  whole  people,  but  also  in  judging  its  position  during  the  Middle  Ages, 
relation  to  the  Revival  of  Learning,  and  its  literary  predominance  at  the  time  of  the 

♦The  best  statement  of  this  view  is  found  in  Fauriel,  o.  c.  II,  page  443.  Compare  also 
Schuchardt,  o.  c.  I,  pp.  44  et  seq.;  and  Ronsch,  o.  c.  page  12.  Grober,  Vulgarlateinische  Sub- 
strate romanischer  Worter,  A.  L.  L.  vol.  I,  pp.  204'et  seq.,  contains  some  interesting  suggestions 
as  to  the  relation  of  the  vulgar  Latin  to  the  provincial  dialects.  The  German  authorities  should 
be  read,  however,  in  the  light  of  an  interesting  note  by  Bonnet,^c.  page  31,  note.  The  most 
recent  extensive  work  upon  the  non-literary  Latin,  though  confined  to  a  particular  field,  is  Cooper's 
Word  Formation  in  the  Roman  Sermo  Plebeius,  Boston,  1896. 


2  MEDIAEVAL    AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

Renaissance.  We  are  not  at  the  present  time  conscious  of  any  fundamental,  deep- 
lying  transformation  going  on  in  our  own  language.  It  is  extending  its  vocabulary, 
assimilating  new  words  and  excreting  exhausted  ones  right  along,  as  part  of  the 
vital  process  attending  its  growth  ;  but  its  grammar  is  essentially  the  same  that  it 
was  at  the  time  of  Chaucer,  and  it  requires  no  artificial,  no  external  influence  to 
keep  it  so.  On  the  other  hand,  the  testimony  of  its  own  writers  apart,  the  very 
existence  of  the  Romance  languages  attests  the  fact  that  there  was  going  on  in  the 
very  heart  and  core  of  the  Latin  language  a  change  that  was  hinted  at  rather  than 
recorded  in  its  written  literature.  The  analytic  tendency  is  already  visible  in  the 
Senatus  Consultum  de  Bacchanalibus,  at  the  opening  of  the  second  century  before 
the  Christian  era.  How  wide  and  how  rapid  the  divergence  that  took  place  be- 
tween written  and  spoken  Latin  during  the  classical  period  may  always  remain 
largely  a  matter  for  conjecture  ;  but  that  there  was  such  a  divergence  is  certain. 
The  change  in  the  popular  speech  was  comprehensive.  Had  it  been  one  of  vocal- 
ization and  vocabulary  alone,  the  Romance  languages  would  have  been  as  syn- 
thetic as  modern  Greek,  or  possibly  more  so.  Had  the  change  been  purely  gram- 
matical, we  should  have  had  a  modern  Latin  in  universal  use  similar  in  some  of  its 
features  perhaps  to  the  popular  Latin  of  the  Gesta  Romanoj'um. 

Classical  Latin,  then,  was  in  one  sense  artificial.  It  retained  its  elevation 
against  the  force  of  gravity ;  it  was  built  to  express  scholarly  thoughts ;  it  was 
adapted  in  its  very  genesis  to  become  the  language  of  learning  and  official  corre- 
spondence. And  though  this  fact  of  its  internal  history  may  play  a  subordinate 
part,  we  must  take  it  into  account  when  we  attempt  to  explain  the  persistence  of 
Latin  through  the  Dark  Ages,  and  its  revival  in  classical  form  contemporaneously 
with  the  maturing  of  the  vulgar  tongues  of  Europe.  For,  after  all,  this  revival, 
dependent  as  it  was  upon  all  the  past  history  of  Latin,  was  a  curious,  an  entirely 
unprecedented  phenomenon.  That  two  such  indigenous  things  as  Gothic  archi- 
tecture and  Romance  literature  should  have  succumbed,  the  one  entirely  and  the 
other  partially,  to  classical  influences,  is  an  altogether  diflerent  thing  from  the 
melting  away  of  Italian  native  art  and  literature  before  the  glory  of  Greek  genius. 
And  though  in  literature  the  Romance  inspiration  ultimately  reasserted  itself,  it  was 
only  after  being  profoundly  modified  by  its  long  tutelage  to  the  elder  Muses.  It 
was  those  who  strove  to  adapt  Latin  to  Greek  literary  ideals  and  to  the  demands 
made  upon  it  by  Rome's  suddenly  widened  intercourse  with  other  nations,  that,  by 
the  very  fixity  and  formal  correctness  which  they  imparted  to  that  language,  laid  the 
foundations  for  the  long  supremacy  which  it  never  would  have  possessed  had  it  re- 
mained in  sympathetic  touch  with  the  rapid  evolution  of  the  spoken  speech.  And 
to  just  the  extent  that  it  was  influenced  by  that  evolution  did  it  become  perverted 
and  incapable  of  performing  the  function  for  which  it  was  designed. 

The  popular  speech  of  the  Romans  was  becoming  Italian  by  the  time  that 
Rome  had  conquered  Italy.  Still  there  was  an  intense,  peasant-like  conservatism 
about  the  Roman  commons  that  led  them  to  retain  long  and  tenaciously  certain 
archaic  features  of  their  early  language.  It  is  probable,  however,  that  the  large 
influx  of  foreigners  during  the  late  Republic  and  early  Empire  had  a  cosmopolitan 
influence  upon  the  urban  dialect.  The  vicissitudes  attending  Rome's  subsequent 
political  misfortunes  were  reflected  in  the  cultivated  and  the  popular  language 
alike,  with  this  exception,  that  the  latter  preserved  its  vitality  upon  the  tongues  of 


LATIN    OF   THE    MIDDLE    AGES.  3 

the  people,  while  the  former  tended  to  become  a  sort  of  official  lingua  franca  with 
the  monks  and  notaries,  and  even  with  the  learned  was  modified  by  the  influence 
of  the  colloquial  dialects  and  new  forms  of  thought,  until  it  lost  nearly  every  vestige 
of  its  former  elegance  and  grace,  and  became  the  barbarous  Latin  which,  after  serv- 
ing as  a  vehicle  for  the  thought  of  Western  Europe  for  seven  centuries,  both  by  its 
negative  and  its  positive  influence,  contributed  to  the  later  revival  of  that  tongue  in 
its  classic  purity  tha,t  was  so  important  a  feature  of  the  Renaissance. 

At  the  time  of  the  Revival  of  Learning,  however,  Latin  could  not  be  purged 
at  once  of  all  that  it  had  acquired  and  more  or  less  thoroughly  assimilated  during 
the  thousand  years  of  its  literary  eclipse.  It  therefore  becomes  important  for  us 
to  get  at  least  a  general  idea  of  this  so-called  barbarous  Latin,  not  only  because  of 
its  intrinsic  value  in  linguistic  history,  but  also  in  order  that  we  may  better  under- 
stand the  details  of  character  that  distinguish  the  .Latin  of  the  Renaissance  from 
the  Latin  of  Cicero  and  his  contemporaries  and  immediate  successors. 

II. 

The  causes  that  occasioned  the  degradation  of  Latin  in  the  Middle  Ages  were 
manifold,  and  we  cannot  hope  to  trace  their  influence  in  detail.  That  language 
had  reached  its  highest  development  in  an  urban  centre  of  extreme  culture,  under 
the  influence  of  literary  patronage,  in  an  atmosphere  of  pagan  artistic  and  literary 
ideals  and  philosophic  thought.  It  was  natural  that  when  these  conditions  were 
changed,  and  in  most  instances  completely  reversed,  the  result  should  be  a  pro- 
found modification  of  the  language  which  they  had  produced.  Not  only  were 
rhetorical  elegance  and  literary  forms  affected,  but  grammar  and  vocabulary  as 
well.  In  a  very  general  way  we  may  attempt  to  classify  the  causes  that  gave  to 
mediaeval  Latin  its  ultimate  form,  but  we  cannot  assume  that  this  classification  is 
absolutely  exhaustive,  nor  that  its  divisions  are  in  every  instance  mutually  exclusive. 

I.  Christian  Influence  :  This  is  seen 

(«)  In  the  introduction  of  new  abstract  terms,  Greek  words,  and  Greek  gram- 
matical forms,  by  the  Church  Fathers  and  translators  ; 

(^)  In  the  antagonistic  attitude  toward  pagan  literature,  and  consequently 
toward  pagan  literary  forms  and  ideals  ; 

(^)  In  the  favor  shown  to  plebeian  words,  idioms,  and  literary  forms. 

II.  Political  Influence  :  This  resulted 

(^)  In  the  introduction  of  a  large  number  of  technical  terms  designating 
political  and  social — including  ecclesiastical — institutions  ; 

(^)  In  the  introduction  of  proper  names  of  persons  and  places  foreign  to 
classical  literature. 

III.  Ignorance  and  Intellectual  Apathy  :  This  resulted  of  course  from  the 
political  and  social  conditions,  and  we  see  its  influence 

(a)  In  inaccurate  orthography  and  arbitrary  grammatical  irregularities  ; 

(^)  In  the  disappearance  of  classical  Latin  as  a  spoken  language  over  large 
areas  and  among  a  large  part  of  the  population  ; 

(^)  In  credulity,  poverty  of  thought  and  literary  inspiration,  and  the  general 
intellectual  barrenness  and  lack  of  originality  that  characterized  the  Dark  Ages. 


4  MEDI/EVAL   AND    RENAISSANCE   LATINITY. 

These!  are  some  of  the  causes  that  make  the  history  of  Latin  different  from 
that  of  its  sister  language  Greek,  for  instance,  or  from  what  we  may  reasonably 
anticipate  will  be  the  history  of  English  or  any  other  of  the  more  important 
modern  tongues.  Had  the  Latin  speaking  races  retained  their  political  integrity 
and  their  moral  and  intellectual  stamina,  their  language  might  have  undergone  a 
gradual  process  of  transformation  ;  it  probably  would  have  become  more  analytic, 
analogous  possibly  to  modern  German  ;  rhyme  and  accentual  rhythm  would  doubt- 
less have  taken  the  place  of  quantity  metre  in  verse  ;  new  words  would  have  been 
coined  to  meet  the  new  demands  made  upon  the  language  by  industrial  develop- 
ment and  the  evolution  of  thought  and  institutions.  But  the  continuity  of  the 
literary  language  would  not  have  been  lost.  We  should  have  had  an  Old  Latin, 
a  Middle  Latin,  and  a  New  Latin  perhaps,  but  not  a  classical  Latin,  a  barbarous 
Latin,  and  a  Rennaissance  Latin.  The  spoken  and  the  written  language  would 
have  developed  hand  in  hand. 

It  is  true  that  the  terms  Middle  and  New  Latin  are  being  used  to-day,  and 
that  those  scholars  who  are  most  familiar  with  the  history  of  the  Latin  language  as 
a  whole  are  most  ready  to  concede  the  organic  unity  of  the  three  phases  that  this 
implies  in  its-  developmentj  and  to  see  under  what  at  first  blush  appears  arbitrary 
and  artificial  the  working  of  the  same  linguistic  laws  that  obtain  in  the  popular 
speech.  We  cannot  speak  of  Latin  as  a  dead  language,  connoting  what  we  gen- 
erally do  by  the  adjective,  until  after  the  time  of  Luther.  But  if  it  continued  to 
live  it  was  as  an  exotic  plant ;  it  was  a  product  of  the  hot-house  so  to  speak,  and 
subject  to  all  the  abnormal  sporting  and  variation  that  such  a  condition  invariably 
produces. 

Christian  influences  began,  with  the  earliest  converts,  among  the  lowest  classes  of 
Roman  society,  and  worked  for  a-  long  time  in  a  latent  and  unapparent  way  within 
the  vulgar  dialect  before  they  finally  broke  through  into  the  superimposed  stratum 
of  the  literary  speech.  When  they  did  manifest  themselves  in  writing,  therefore, 
they  did  so  with  a  definiteness  and  assurance  and  vigor  that  betokened  their  pre- 
vious discipline  and  humble  origin.  They  came  fresh  from  contact  with  the  mother 
earth,  and  worked  with  Antaean  energy  upon  the  language.  Their  result  during 
the  Roman  period  is  represented  in  two  distinct  though  closely  associated  bodies 
of  literature,  the  exegetical  and  polemical  writings  of  the  Church  Fathers  on  the 
one  hand,  and  the  translations  that  later  formed  the  basis  for  the  Vulgate  upon  the 
other.  ^ 

Considered  as  a  whole,  the  patristic  literature,  though  it  differs  widely  from  that 
of  the  pagan  writers,  does  not  even  mark  a  phase  of  the  transition  to  Mediaeval 
Latin.  It  is  true  that  even  the  earliest  of  the  Christian  writers,  like  Tertullian, 
ventured  to  create  a  new  style,  and  to  draw  heavily  upon  the  colloquial  speech  for 
new  and  vigorous  forms  of  expression.'^  Plautus  doubtless  did  the  same.  The 
introduction  of  fresh  blood  from  the  veins  of  the  people  was  not  going  to  hurt 
Latin,  but  rather  to  insure  its  preservation  and  continued  growth.  The  Church  Fath- 
ers, like  the  great  jurists,  adapted  the  language,  without  any  considerable  detri- 
ment to  itself,  to  the  new  thoughts  that  it  was  called  upon  to  express.  It  is  be- 
cause we  see  the  language  in  the  light  of  subsequent  events,  for  which  Christian 
literature  was  not  itself  responsible,  that  any  change  from  the  Augustan  standard 

*  Hauschild,  o.  c,  page  30,  gives  the  number  of  new  words  in  Tertullian's  writings  as  470. 


LATIN    OF   THE   MIDDLE    AGES.  5 

seems  an  evidence  of  deterioration.  The  Christian  writers,  indeed,  were  not  in- 
spired by  the  purely  artistic  impulse  that  had  dominated  the  literature  of  the  clas- 
sical period.  Their  works  were  not  addressed  to  so  homogeneous  and  compact  a 
people.  They  and  their  writings  were  the  product  of  their  age.  But  from  a 
purely  linguistic  point  of  view  their  influence  went  to  maintain  the  integrity  and 
power  of  the  language.     Their  action  upon  it  was  conservative. 

In  the  Vulgate,  however,  we  find  evidence  of  plebeian  influences  of  a  differ- 
ent kind.  The  popular  speech  is  the  field  for  linguistic  experiments,  and  like  all 
such  fields  its  list  of  failures  is  usually  much  longer  than  its  list  of  successes.  The 
Church  Fathers  were,  as  a  rule,  men  of  more  than  mediocre  literary  training,  and 
they  selected  and  employed  new  turns  and  phrases  with  discriminating  judgment. 
On  the  other  hand  the  earliest  translations  of  the  Bible  doubtless  date  from  the 
time  when  Christian  doctrine  was  confined,  so  far  as  the  West  was  concerned,  to  the 
ignorant  classes  of  the  Italian  and  African  cities.  These  versions,  often  of  single 
books,  were  frequently  temporary  makeshifts,  unauthorized  and  by  no  means  uni- 
form,* the  work  of  individual  translators  acting  independently  with  some  transient 
perhaps  and  immediate  object  in  view,f  of  men  who  were  probably  foreigners  at 
Rome  and  knew  Greek  and  Latin  as  the  Jewish  clothing  clerks  of  the  Bowery 
and  Lower  Broadway,  for  instance,  know  German  and  English.  These  men  wrote 
the  language  that  they  spoke,  with  all  its  imperfections  and  irregularities.  The 
hybrid  character  of  their  vocabulary  and  phraseology  indicate  that  lack  of  fine 
linguistic  discrimination  which  characterizes  a  polyglot  commercial  class.  J  The 
solecisms  and  plebeian  colloquialisms  thus  incorporated  in  the  Vulgate  soon  came 
to  partake  in  the  minds  of  the  people  of  the  sacredness  of  the  book  itself,  and 
custom  reconciled  the  ears  of  even  the  more  highly  educated  to  vulgar  phrases  and 
ungrammatical  forms.  §  Even  Jerome,  in  the  revision  which  gradually  superseded 
all  other  versions  in  the  course  of  the  Middle  Ages,  did  not  try  to  use  good 
grammar  where  it  intruded  upon  familiar  forms  and  received  phraseology.  ||  In 
Africa  a  bishop  was  mobbed  by  his  parishioners  because  he  allowed  the  sacred 
text  to  be  tampered  with  in  the  interest  of  literary  purity.  Thus  canonized  in 
their  scripture,  the  speech  of  the  Roman  populace  not  only  exercised  a  most  im- 
portant influence  of  the  subsequent  literature  of  the  Middle  Ages,  but  it  so  far 

*  Tertullian  himself  cites  Bible  passages  two  to  three  different  ways,  Hauschild,  o.  c,  page  ii. 

t  Augustine,  de  Doct.  Christ.,  2,  11;  P.  L.,  XXXIV,  34:  Ut  enint  cuique  pritnis  fidei 
temporibus  in  manus  venit  codex  Craecus,  et  aliquantuliitn /acultatis  sibi  utriusgue  littguae 
habere  videtur,  ausus  est  interpretari.     Latinorutn  interpretunt  injinita  varietas. 

X  Tertullian,  ad  Marc,  2,  9  ;  P.  L.,  II,  321,  A :  Quidatn  enitn  de  Graece  interpretantes, 
non  recogitata  differentia  nee  curata  proprietate  verborum. 

§  Augustine,  de  Doct.  Christ.,  II,  14 ;  P.  L.,  XXXIV,  45  :  Tanta  est  vis  consuetudinis 
etiam  ad  discendutn,  ut  qui  in  scripturis  Sanctis  quodain  modo  nutriti  sunt  magis  alias  locu- 
tiones  ntirentur  easque  tninus  Latinas  putent,  quatn  illas  qtias  in  scripturis  didicerunt  neque 
in  Latinae  linguae  auctoribus  reperiuntur.  And  in  the  preceding  chapter,  Illud  enitn  quod 
iam  au/erre  non possuntus  de  ore  cantantiutn  populorunt,  'super  ipsunt  autemfloriet  sancti- 
ficatio  mea,'  nihil  pro/ecto  sententiae  detrahit ;  auditor  tamen  peritior  mallet  hoc  corrigi,  ut 
non  'Jloriet'  sed  ' /lore bit'  dicatur,  nee  quicquam  impedit  correctionem  nisi  eonsuetudo 
cantantium. 

II  Hieronymous,  Com.  in  Ezech.,  40,  5  :  Illud  autern  semel  tnonuisse  sufficiat,  nosse  etn 
cubitum  et  cubita  neutriai  appellari  genere,  sed  pro  simplicitate  et  facilitate  intelligentite 
vulgique  consuetudine  ponere  et  genere  tnasculino.  Non  enint  cut  a  nobis  est  vitare  ser- 
ntonutn  vitia,  sed  scripturae  sanctae  obscuritatem  quibuscumque  verbis  ditserere. 


V 


6  MEDIAEVAL   AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

determined  the  form  of  translation  into  modem  tongues  as  to  leave  its  traces  in 
the  language  and  writings  of  the  present  day. 

Without  pretending  to  be  exhaustive  the  following  list  indicates  some  of  the 
principal  features  of  the  sermo  plebeius  which  the  Vulgate  transmitted  to  the  lan- 
guage and  literature  of  the  succeeding  period  : 

I.  Vocabulary. 

(1)  Abstracts  and  words  with  typical  endings  :    adiur amentum^  Tob. ,  9,  5  ; 
^             getieramen.  Math.,  23,  33;  sanctificium,   Ps.,   77,  69;  exoratorium,  Ezech.,  44, 

27  ;  deambulacrum,  I  Kings,  7,  2  ;  ornatura,  I  Tim.,  2,  9  ;  pro77iptale,  Luke,  12, 
3  ;  inundiantia,  Luke,  6,  48 ;  circuitas,  Ezech. ,  48,  30 ;  adnuntiator,  Acts,  1 7, 
19;  apostatrix,  Ezech.,  2,  -^;  frendor.  Math.,  8,  12',  pigredo,  Prov.,  19,  15; 
abladatio.  Gen.,  21,  8;  aeditiia.  Acts,  19,  35  ;  coruscus,  Luke,  17,  24.  There 
are  some  new  diminutives,  agniciihis,  John,  2,  15  ;  tortula.  Num.,  II,  8  ;  dextra- 
liolum,  Judith,  lo,  3.  Substantives  are  formed  from  adjectives  and  participles, 
infernis.  Gen.,  37,  35  ;  discens,  John,  6,  66. 

(2)  New  adjectives  with  conventional  endings,  desperabilis,  Jerem.,  15,  18; 
per/iatilis,  Jerem.,  22,  14;  j?iagnalis,  Luke,  9,  44;  commixticius ,  Ezech.,  27,  17; 
inebriosus,  Prov.,  26,  9;  molinus,  Luke,  17,  2  ;  cooper arius,  I  Cor.,  3,  9  ;  fuma- 
bundus.  Gen.,  15,  17  ;  bicaineratuSy  Gen.,  6,  16.  New  adverbs  also  occur : 
pompatice,  Amos,  6,  I  ;  praefesHnanter,  Esther,  6,  14. 

(3)  Many  new  verbs,  most  of  the  first  conjugation.  Some  are  derived  from  nouns, 
cusiodiare,  Luke,  8,  20  ;  exefnplare,  Col.,  2,  15  ;  others  from  adjectives,  iniquit- 
are,  Acts,  7,  26  ;  deteriorare,  Ps.,  37,  6  ;  proximare.  Math.,  26,  46;  several  are 
oiQx&€^ox\^\VL,  hymnizare,  Mark,  14,  26;  scandalizare.  Math.,  15,  12;  evang- 
ilizare,  Math.,  II,  5  >  ^^<i  there  are  others  from  various  sources,  altificare,  John, 
12,  34 ;  lucificare,  John,  1,9;  abladare.  Gen.,  21,  8  ;  abrenuntiare,  Luke,  9,  61. 

(4)  Such  new  compounds  as  the  following  appear,  admanumdeductor ,  Acts,  13, 
II  ;  dictoaudientia^  I  Sam.,  15,  22  ;  benestabilis,  I  Cor.,  7,  35  ;  concorporalis^ 
Eph.,  3,  6  ;  quincupliciter.  Gen.,  43,  34.  Parallel  to  these  compounds  and  re- 
sponding to  the  same  demand  that  created  them,  are  a  large  number  of  words 
borrowed  directly  from  the  Greek. 

(5)  Combinations  of  two  prepositions  or  a  preposition  and  an  adverb  occur  oc- 
casionally  that  suggest  a  coming  Romance  word,  de  forts  (dehors).  Math.,  23,  25 
and  26  ;  de  retro  (derriere),  Luke,  8,  44;  de  sursum  (dessus),  Job,  18,  16;  ab 
ante  (avant),  Luke,  19,  4;  de  sub  (dessous),  Exod.,  17,  14. 

(3)  Many  words  are  used  with  modified  meanings.  Animositas  (wrath), 
Hebr.,  11,  27  {coriina  cvu-tain),  Exod.,  26,  I  ;  mansio  (dwelling),  John,  14,  2, 
have  given  corresponding  words  in  English. 

II.  Orthography. 

While  peculiarities  of  orthography  in  the  manuscripts  of  the  Vulgate  rest  upon 
too  uncertain  authority,  in  most  instances,  to  prove  much  more  than  lack  of  uni- 
formity, there  are  forms  which  are  corroborated  from  other  soiu-ces — the  Lombard 
laws,  for  instance — and  are  interesting  from  the  light  they  throw  upon  the  relation 
on  ancient  pronunciation  to  modern  Romance  words.     Such  are  the  following  : 


LATIN    OF    THE   MIDDLE    AGES.  7 

iscientia  for  scientia,  II  Cor.,  6,  6  ;  isperare  for  sperare,  Hebr.,  H,  i  ;  istare  for 
stare ^  Ps.,  133,  I  ;  spandere  for  expandere,  Deut.,  32,  ii  ;  speriri  for  experiri 
Hebr.,  11,  29  ;  grossus  for  crassus,  I  Kings,  12,  lo  ;  lanterna  for  lucerna,  John, 
18,3. 

III.  Flexion  and  Syntax. 

(1)  Irregularities  of  declension  occur — ilium  for  ?7/«^,  Math.,  13,  20;  ««<?  is 
a  dative,  Num.,  19,  14;  lignum  humilem,  Exod. ,  17,  24,  z.n^  vidua  pauper  a,  Luke, 
21,  3,  are  representative  errors  in  case  of  adjectives,  as  are  2X^0 proximior^  Hebr., 
6,  9,  and  minimissimus,  II  Kings,  18,  4.  There  is  a  like  tendency  to  confuse 
conjugations:  exiety  Math.,  2,  6;rediet,  Lev.,  15,  io\ Jloriet,  Ps.,  81,  15;  sciboy 
Ps.  68,  125, 

(2)  Prepositions  do  not  follow  classical  usage — apud  for  ad,  abierunt  apud  se, 
John,  20,  10;  de'xs  instrumental,  extergere  de  linteo,  John,  13,  5  ;  in  is  used  in- 
differently with  the  accusative  and  ablative,  in  veritatem  stetit,  John,  8,  44 ;  fugi- 
antin  monlibus,  Luke,  12,  21 ;  and  we  find  such  phrases  as  sine  eum^  John,  I,  3  ; 
de  hancy  John,  12,  27. 

(3)  Cases  were  also  confused  after  verbs, — obaudiant  eum,  Math.,  7,27  ;  bene- 
dixit  eum.  Gen.,  28,  I;  non  te  nocebunt,  Num.,  5>  ^9  5  suade  Hebraeam  islam, 
Jud.,  12,  10. 

(4)  The  finite  verb  takes  the  place  of  the  infinitive  in  principal  clauses  indi- 
rect discourse,  vidit  Deus  quod  esset  bonum.  Gen.,  I,  12  ;  scio  quia  bonus  es  tu,  I 
Kings,  19,  9  ;  cognovit  David  quonian  conjirmasset  eum  Dominus  regem  super 
Israel,  II  Kings,  5,  12.  On  the  other  hand,  the  infinitive  is  used  regularly  to 
express  purpose,   venimus  adorare  eum,  Math.,    2,   2;    quis  demonstrabit  vobis 

fugere  a  ventura  ira  ?  Math.,  3,  7. 

(5)  There  is  a  tendency  to  make  all  subordinate  sentences  subjunctive,  with 
the  exception  of  those  expressing  condition,  where  we  often  find  a  simple  inversion 
or  an  imperative  used,  Mel  invenisti,  comede  quod  sufficit  tibi,  Prov  ,  25,  16  ;  Aperi 
oculos  tuos  et  saturare panibus,  Prov.,  20,  13. 

We  have  considered  the  Vulgate  more  at  length  because  it  probably  exercised 
a  greater  influence  than  any  other  single  book  upon  the  Latin  of  the  Middle  Ages. 
It  was  used  in  a  form  that  was  from  a  literary  point  of  view  about  equally  corrupt 
in  every  part  of  western  Europe,  by  all  classes  not  entirely  illiterate,  during  the 
whole  period  from  the  downfall  of  the  Western  Empire  to  the  Revival  of  Learning. 
Its  religious  importance  gave  it  in  a  certain  sense  literary  infallibility  in  the  opinion 
of  its  readers.  Its  variations  from  the  classical  form  were  in  sympathy  with  the 
trend  of  evolution  in  the  spoken  language.  The  relation  of  the  Romance  lan- 
guages to  Latin,  and  the  processes  by  which  they  were  evolved  from  it,  are  not 
germane  to  our  subject ;  but  it  is  certain  that  the  strong  undercurrent  of  living  col- 
loquial speech  was  flowing  in  the  direction  indicated  by  the  language  of  the  Vul- 
gate and  tended  to  reinforce  the  influence  of  the  latter  upon  the  literary  idiom. 

We  must  remember  also  that  the  very  spirit  of  the  age  was  antagonistic  to 
classical  culture  by  the  time  that  the  Christian  faith  had  been  embraced  by  the 
barbarians.  Gregory  the  Great,  the  Pope  who  first  sent  missionaries  to  Saxon 
England,  was  one  of  those  who  espoused  most  ardently  the  cause  of  literary  bar- 
barism, if  we  mayuse  the  expression.     He  does  not  avoid  crude  rhetoric,  bar- 


8  MEDIEVAL    AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

barous  expressions,  inaccurate  syntax,*  for  he  considers  it  unworthy  of  their 
divine  dignity  that  the  messages  of  heaven  should  be  subject  to  the  rules  of  Do- 
natus.  The  Church  councils  issued  decree  after  decree  against  the  book  of  the 
Gentiles, t  and  Gregory  forbade  the  teaching  of  the  profane  literature  in  cathedral 
schools  because  the  praises  of  Jove  should  not  be  heard  from  the  same  mouth 
as  the  praises  of  Christ.  J  He  commends  Benedict  in  the  second  book  of  his 
dialogues  because  he  gave  up  liberal  studies  :  *♦  Recessit  igitur  scienter  nescius  ei 
sapie7iter  indodus.'''' 

Benedict  himself  was  the  author  of  a  work  that,  though  far  less  important  than 
the  Vulgate,  presumably  exercised  great  influence  upon  the  Latin  of  the  monas- 
teries. This  was  the  Regtila  of  his  order,  written  in  the  sixth  century.  The  con- 
fusion of  case  after  prepositions  is  even  greater  than  in  the  Vulgate,  and  the  exten- 
sion in  the  use  of  the  prepositions  themselves  is  considerable.  Ab  is  used  with 
the  ablative  after  comparatives,  meliores  ab  aliis,  2,  46 ;  nihil  a  Christo  carius, 
5,3;  in  certain  adverbial  constructions,  a  longo,  7,  39  ;  and  with  the  accusative, 
a  caput,  18,  53  ;  a  Kalendas,  48,  1 8.  De  is  used  with  the  genitive,  de  pro" 
phetorum,  14,  14;  with  the  accusative,  de  ordines,  63,  I  ;  in  place  of  ex,  egiedi 
de  monasterio,  29,  3  ;  with  ablative  in  place  of  partitive  genitive,  7te  aliquant  de 
ovibus perdat,  27,  13  ;  portio  de  vino,  43,  t^"^  ;  de  eadem  libra  tertia pars,  39,  9  ; 
also,  like  ab,  with  comparative,  amplius  de  media  node,  8,  4.  We  likewise  find 
cum  and  sine  used  with  the  accusative,  ad  constructions  for  the  dative,  diversus  for 
varius  (divers),  the  omission  of  final  letters,  ledione  et  versu  for  ledionem  et  Uer- 
sum,  17,  12  ;  and  a  confusion  of  the  nominative  and  accusative  forms,  audiamus 
Dominus — dicens,  7,  35.  | 

Before  leaving  the  subject  of  distinctively  Church  literature  we  might  remark 
that  in  a  translation  like  the  Vulgate,  made  by  men  who  doubtless  used  both  Greek 
and  Latin  colloquially,  but  neither  of  them  with  scholarly  accuracy,  many  Greek 
constructions  were  taken  over  into  Latin  without  modification.  Such  are  the  geni- 
tive absolute  and  the  gerundive  with  in  for  the  Greek  infinitive  with  the  article  and 
preposition.  Where  a  construction  that  is  apparently  Greek  persisted  in  the  Mid- 
dle Ages,  however,  it  is  probably  safer  to  attribute  it  to  plebeian  Latin — where  it 
may  have  been  derived  from  the  Greek  anterior  to  the  Christian  period — than  to 
the  influence  of  later  Christian  literature.     Classical  Greek  disappeared  even  more 

♦  Praef.  Job.;  P.  L.  ;  Non  metacistni  collisionem  fugio,  non  barbarismi  con/usionem  de- 
vito,  situs  tnotusque  praepositionum  casusgue  servare  contemno,  quia  indignum  vehenienter 
existitno  ut  verba  caelestia  oraculi  restringain  sub  regulis  Donati. 

t  Decretum  Gratianum,  Pars  Prima,  Dist.  37  :  c.  i.,  a  decree  of  the  council  of  Carthage,  in 
398. — Libros  gentiliutn  non  legat  episcopus ;  c.  vii,  Legimus  de  beato  Hieronytno  quod  dunt 
libros  legeret  Ciceronis  ab  angelo  correptus  est,  eo  quod  vir  Christianus  paganorunt  figmentis 
intenderet. 

X  Ep.,  II,  54 ;    P.  L.  :    In  uno  se  ore  cum  lovis  laudibus  Christi  laudes  non  capiunt. 

\  This  confusion  of  case  forms  and  consequent  extension  in  the  use  of  prepositions  was  a  phe- 
nomenon that  could  only  occur  while  Latin  was  still  spoken  by  the  commons  ;  for  it  depended 
primarily  upon  pronunciation.  Such  errors  as  appear  in  literature  with  Benedict  had  been 
common  in  the  inscriptions  from  an  early  period,  certainly  from  the  second  century  on  (C.  I.  L, 
Vol,  15).  Final  s  was  often  omitted  in  classical  times ;  we  know  that  by  the  sixth  century  final 
m  was  regularly  elided,  and  that  there  was  no  distinction  made  in  the  pronunciation  of  ae,  i  and 
e  at  the  end  of  nouns  ;  u  and  o  had  also  become  practically  identical.  The  spoken  noun,  there- 
fore, became  as  impotent  to  express  case  relations  in  Latin  as  it  is  in  English.  Cf.  Sittl,  Zur 
Betheilung  des  sogenannten  Mittellateins,^.L.L.,  Vol.  II.,  page  555. 


¥ 


LATIN    OF    THE    MIDDLE    AGES.  9 

completely  than  classical  Latin  from  the  curricula  of  the  schools  after  the  sixth 
century.  Its  sporadic  persistence  in  the  Irish  cloisters  and  the  Mediterranean 
ports  had  little  or  no  effect  upon  mediaeval  literature. 

The  influence  of  political  and  social  changes  upon  Latin  is  more  manifest  in 
profane  than  in  religious  literature.  In  this  connection  Gregory,  Bishop  of  Tours, 
who  wrote  at  the  very  close  of  the  sixth  century,  is  worthy  of  consideration  for 
several  reasons.  He  was  really  among  the  first  of  the  mediaeval  chroniclers,  and 
yet  he  wrote  in  the  twilight  of  classical  culture.  His  works  occasionally  give  us 
a  glimpse  into  the  life  of  his  age,  and  a  view  of  the  personality  of  the  author  and 
his  relations  to  his  contemporaries  that  is  interesting,  and  goes  far  toward  making 
his  writings  real  literature.  Gregory  is  still  an  individual,  not  a  mere  member  of 
an  order,  like  the  monkish  chroniclers.  He  was  one  of  the  last  who  wrote  when 
Latin  was  still  a  spoken  language  among  the  commons.*  It  was  his  mother 
tongue.f 

In  addition  to  a  work  upon  miracles,  ecclesiastical  lives,  commentaries  upon 
the  psalms  and  a  liturgical  treatise  De  Cursu  Stdlarum^  Gregory  wrote  a  History 
of  the  Franks  that  comes  as  near  to  being  a  secular  work  as  anything  written  by  a. 
bishop  in  the  sixth  century  could.  To  be  sure  he  begins,  like  Irving  in  Knicker- 
bocker, with  the  creation,  and  he  prefaces  his  work  with  a  confession  of  faith. 
His  lack  of  the  historical  critical  faculty  recalls  the  reflections  of  Robert  Elsmere 
upon  the  authenticity  of  miracles.  We  are  in  an  intellectual  childhood  compared 
with  the  age  of  Cicero  or  Livy.  Gregory  seems  to  start  out  with  the  mediaeval 
assumption  that  the  more  incredible  a  thing  is  the  greater  the  a  /ncrr probability 
of  its  being  true.  In  fine,  though  Gregory  writes  like  a  man  and  not  like  a  monk, 
in  cast  of  thought,  and  to  a  great  extent  in  literary  style  and  language,  with  him 
the  Middle  Ages  have  already  begtm. 

Gregory  wrote  before  the  nadir  of  political  confusion  and  intellectual  apathy 
had  been  reached ;  but  he  saw  it  approaching,  and  there  was  no  affect'ed  pessim- 
ism in  the  depressing  exordium  to  the  preface  of  his  history,  where  he  laments  the 
waning  away  and  death  of  liberal  culture  in  the  Gallic  cities.  J  He  was  not  un- 
conscious of  his  own  inability  to  command  a  classical  style,  as  we  can  infer  from 
the  frequent  passages  in  his  prefaces,  notably  the  apostrophe  to  himself  in  the  pre- 
face to  the  Confessoris,^  probably  the  last  important  work  that  he  ever  wrote. 

Though  it  will  involve  the  repetition  of  some  things  noted  in  connection  with 
religious  literature,  we  can  profitably  sum  up  here  those  salient  peculiarities  of 
Mediaeval  Latin  that  appear  in  the  works  of  Gregory,  with  additional  illustrations 
occasionally  from  Anthimus,  a  Gallic  writer  who  composed  a  work  upon  dialectics 
early  in  the  following  century.     The  reappearance  of  characteristic  features  of  the 

*Cf.  Bonnet,  o.  c,  introduction,  page  23. 

f  Speaking  of  Orleans  he  says,  Et  hinc  lingua  Syriorurn,  hinc  Latinorum,  hinc  etiant  ipso- 
rum  ludaeorum — concrepe^bat.      H.  F..  8,  i. 

X  Decedente,atque  inttno  potius  pereunte  ab  urbibus  Gallicanis  liberaliunt  cultura  littera- 
rum,  cum  nunnuUae  res  gererentur  vel  rede  vel  improbe,  ac  feritas  gentium  desaeviret, 
regum  furor  acueretur,  ecclesiae  impugnarentur  etc. 

g  <9  rustice — qui  nomina  discernere  nescis ;  qui  saepius  pro  masculinis  /eminea,pro 
femineis  neutra,  et  pro  neutris  tnasculina  commutas  ;  qui  ipsas  quoque  praepositiones,  quas 
nobilium.  dictatorum  (sc.  scriptoruvi)  observari  sanxit  auctoritas,  loco  debito  plerumque  non 
locat :  natn  ablativis  accusativa,  et  rursutn  accusativis  ablativa praeponis. 


lO  MEDIEVAL   AND    RENAISSANCE   LATINITY. 

Vulgate  is  noticeable  here,  and  we  already  have  the  key  note  of  the  changes  upon 
which  the  various  modulations  of  the  Middle  Ages  were  based. 

I.  Vocabulary. 

(1)  Shades  of  meaning  in  classical  words  were  lost,  especially  in  case  of  di- 
minutives, frequentatives,  and  compounds.  InfanUdus  iox  puer,  H.  F.,  6,  26; 
cellula  for  cella^  H.  F.,  6,  29;  corpusculum  for  corpus,  7,  46  et  passim;  agitare 
for  agere,  I,  26;  defensare  for  defendere,  3,  13;  5,  26,  9,  36,  et  passim ;  while 
such  compounds  occur  as  delibare,  sacrijicia  delibare,  2,  lo  ;  detruncabat^  2,4; 
demanicatus,  mutilated,  7,  15  ;  in  Burgundia7n  peraccessit,  5,  13  ;  pacem  Jirma- 
vit,  9,  II.* 

(2)  Classical  words  assume  new  meanings  :  dictator  for  scriptor,  quoted 
above  ;  cellula  is  chapel,  2,  14 ;  ordinare  is  to  ordain,  2,  41 ;  lapsus  is  a  net,  8, 
10 ;  sponsare  is  used  for  nubere  or  uxorem  ducere,  9,  28  ;  porta  for  ostium,  2, 
38 ;  campum  praeparare  has  about  the  same  force  as  j/^?  potestatem  facer e  in 
Caesar,  2,  27  ;  4,  50,  5,  18,  et  passim  ;  agens  becomes  a  noun,  meaning  a  public 
or  private  agent,  6,  19;  9,  35  ;  regestum  is  used  for  thesaurus,  9,  9. 

(3)  A  rare  classical  word  displaces  the  usual  classical  word,  sometimes  with  a 
slight  modification  of  meaning,  manducare  occurs  regularly  for  edere  or  comedere 
in  Anthimus,   and  occasionally  in  Gregory  ;    we  also  find  in  the  former  cabal- 

V  lus  and  caballicare  for  equus  and  equitare.  "Water  mills  have  displaced  hand 
mills,  and  so  pistrinum  has  given  way  to  molendina,  3,  1 9.  Civitas  designates 
the  seat  of  a  bishop,  3,  19. 

(4)  Abstract  and  technical  terms,  of  Greek  origin  or  built  up  from  Latin 
stems,  appear.  It  is  hardly  necessary  to  give  examples  of  these,  as  they  are  in 
most  cases  repetitions  of  words  found  in  the  Vulgate.  Such  expressions  as  elee- 
mosynarius  valde,  6,  20;  clericatus  offlciufn,  8,  H^,  formula^  bench,  whence  our 
word  'form,'  8,  31,  are  perhaps  worth  nothing.  There  are  also  a  number  of  new 
official  designations  that  have  either  been  brought  in  or  given  a  special  meaning 
with  the  Frankish  rule.  Among  these  are  :  capitular e,  9,  30  ;  camerarius,  4,  26  ; 
ducatus,  8,  26  ;  maior  domus,  6,  45  ;  9,  30 ;  refer endarius,  5>  3  ;  descriptor,  9,  30. 

( 5  )  A  few  barbarian  words  have  been  introduced.     Such  are  the  Celtic  agri- 
pennis  (arpent)  unus  stadius habet  agripennes  quinque,  I,  6;  the  German  scrama- 
saxi,  cum  cultris  validis,  quos  vulgo  scramasaxos  vacant,  4,  51  ;  bacchinon  [Bac- 
chus (?)   or  Becher]   cum  pater  is  ligneis,  quas  vulgo  bacchinon  vacant,  9,  28; 
leudes,  2,  42  ;  banni,  bannos  tussit  exigi,  5»  26. 

(6)  Words  are  sometimes  employed  in  new  relations.  Vir  is  used,  as  homo  is 
sometimes  in  earlier  Latin,  in  lieu  of  a  pronoun  ;  et  ecce  vir  quasi  degravi  sofuno 
suscitatus  excutitur,  7,  i.  Jlle  and  utius  frequently  occur  with  the  force  of 
articles — a  use  dating  back  as  far  as  Cicero,  but  much  less  frequent  in  the  clas- 
sical age,  and  unus — alius  are  used  for  alter — alter,  1,  2.  Hora  is  one  of  the 
words  that  tended  to  lose  its  nominal  force.     We  find  ad  horatn,  adora,  in  An- 

*  The  citations  are  from  the  edition  of  the  History  of  the  Franks  by  Amdt,  Monutnenta  Ger- 
maniae  Historica,  Scriptorum  Reruni  Merovingicarum,  Tontus  I.  The  edition  in  the  Recueil 
des  Historiens,  Totn.  II.,  has  been  emendated  so  as  to  lose  its  value  for  linguistic  study.  The 
edition  of  Du  Cange  has  also  been  collated  with  the  two  mentioned,  but  without  any  effect  upon 
the  citations. 


LATIN    OF   THE   MIDDLE    AGES.  II 

thimus,  II,  with  adverbial  force,  and  mala  hora  (malheur)  has  already  become 
an  exclamation  of  inauspicious  significance  ;  cum  de porta  egrederetur,  uno  car- 
rucae  effracto  axe,  omnes  *  mala  hora'  dixerunt ;  quod  a  qtiibusdam  pro  auspicio 
suscephim  est,  6,  45.  We  have  another  foreshadowing  of  a  French  expression  in 
Ecce  hie  (ci-git)  Macliavus  mortuos  et  sepultus  iacet,  4,  4  ;  and  likewise  in  rev- 
erentiam  habere  non  sapuit  (sut. )  7,  29. 

Etymology  : 

( 1 )  There  is  a  confusion  of  gender.  Some  twenty  neuters  and  a  very  few 
feminines  become  masculine.  The  reverse  is  true  occasionally.  Neuters  that  be- 
come masculine  are  aceium,  consilium,  corpusctclum,  ferrum,  friguSy  gaudium, 
ingenium,  litus,  linteum,  meritum,  monasteritim,  oppidum,  pavimentum,  regnum, 
robur,  sputum,  stadium,  tentorium,  territorium,  tormentum ;  and  feminines  be- 
coming masculine  are  crux,  frons,  frons,  gens,  hienis,  urbs.  Cibus,  domus,  lec- 
tulus,  locus,  populus,  sarcophagus,  stomachus,  synodus,  thalamus,  thesaurus ; 
while  tumulus  together  with  paries  becomes  neuter.  These  are  as  a  rule  cases 
where  the  adjective  or  case  construction  indicates  the  gender  ;  for  the  pronouns 
are  so  confused  as  to  give  very  little  evidence  as  to  the  gender  of  their  antecedent. 
For  instance  we  find  turrem  qui,  i,  6;  villam  qui,  9,  35  ;  pratum  qui,  3,  15  > 
quae  liber,  1 ,  44. 

(2)  In  declension  we  find  the  singular  of  such  words  as  angustiae,  insidiae, 
sarcinae  {insidia  occurs  in  the  Vulgate)  ;  and  different  declensions  are  confused, 
nonimmemorperiurias,  3,  7  ;  dolus  is  confused  with  dolor  (cf.  Psalms,  23,  4),  5» 
35  ;  contemptor pauperorum,  4,  40  ;  and  in  pronomial  relations,  perillum  ostium, 
7,  22  ;  hicfilia,  3,  31.  The  confusion  of  case  in  relative  pronouns  is  as  bad  as 
the  confusion  of  gender ;  arborem  plenam  pomis,  qua  vulgopruna  vocant,  3,  15  ; 
milia  aureorum,  qua  ille  accipiens,  3,  34  ;    Quae  de  causa,  4,  41. 

The  relative  and  interrogative  pronouns  are  interchanged  in  a  few  instances  ; 
castrum — ,  quid  defensatum  est,  3,  13  ;  Requirite  quod  de  Carthaginiensibus 
scibat  Orhosius,  praef.  V. 

(4)  The  force  of  comparison  is  sometimes  lost  in  the  case  of  adjectives.  This 
had  been  true  in  some  irregular  forms  as  early  as  Seneca,  in  whose  epistle  we  find 
proximior  (li8).  It  is  evidenced  in  Gregory  by  such  examples  as  valde  nequissi- 
mus,  5,  3,  where  we  have  a  weakening  of  the  superlative.  Another  similar  in- 
stance is  vir  sanctissimus  atque  religiosus,  2,  21.  On  the  other  hand  the  comparative 
has  by  implication  the  force  of  the  superlative  in  de  prima  et,  ut  ita  dicam,  nobi- 
liore  suorum  familia,  2,  9.  Melior  has  already  the  force  of  le  meilleur  in  such 
expressions  as  meliores  naiu,  those  of  highest  rank,  6,  45,  and  convocatis  meliori- 
bus  Francis,  in  the  same  chapter. 

(5)  The  irregularity  in  the  inflection  of  verbs  is  very  great,  and  we  can  only 
indicate  by  a  few  examples  the  sort  of  changes  that  took  place.  Deponent  verbs 
become  active,  as  in  case  of  admiror,  admirabam  quod  erat,  7,  22  (cf.  Mark,  7, 
37. — Et  eo  ajHplius  admirabant)  ;  carnes  si  frequenter  utantur.  An  thimus,  4 ; 
and  active  verbs  become  deponent,  Provinciam  ipsam  lues  debellata  est,  8,  39. 
There  is  a  confusion  of  conjugations.  Odi  had  already  become  a  forth  conjuga- 
tion verb  in  the  Vulgate,  and  is  thus  quoted,  '•'■Argue  stultum,  adiciet  odire  te,  " 
8,40.     Occasionally  a  third  conjugation — zV?  verb,  such  as  cupio,  htcomts  fourth 


12  MEDIAEVAL    AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

conjugation,  cum  omnes  cupirent  regnare,  2,  23.  Doubtless  from  the  analogy  of 
iacio  we  have  the  form  iacteretur,  1,  10.  There  are  also  other  instances  of  non- 
classical  forms  of  defective  verbs,  Memineat^  praef.  2  ;  oporiet  te  meminire,  5,  43. 

III.  Syntax  : 

( 1 )  Case  :  We  have  already  had  occasion  to  refer  to  the  confusion  of  case 
after  prepositions.  In  the  thirty  pages  of  Anthimus's  Epistola  de  Observatione 
Ciborum,  de  is  used  about  thirty  times  to  express  relations  that  would  have  been 
expressed  by  the  genitive  or  by  ab  or  ex  constructions  in  classical  Latin.  Super 
is  used  in  place  of  the  dative,  ducem  super  septem  civitates  praeposuit,  2,  20  ;  but 
upon  the  whole  there  is  an  extension  of  the  use  of  the  dative  in  Gregory.  It  is 
used  to  express  limit,  in  the  well-known  anecdote  of  the  chalice  of  Soissons, 
bipennem  urceo  impulit,  2,  27  ;  altera  te  regno  non  mittam,  5,  49  ;  and  with 
damnoy  exilio  damnarettir,  2,  3.  We  also  find  the  dative  where  we  should  expect 
ab  with  the  ablative,  veniam  legentibus  precor,  praef.  I  ;  and  in  place  of  a  geni- 
tive, cui  meminimus,  2,  7.  The  genitive  of  quality  is  used  extensively  ;  the  ab- 
lative frequently  usurps  the  place  of  the  accusative  in  time  and  place  relations  ; 
nominative  and  accusative  absolutes  are  very  common,  and  there  is  a  general  ten- 
dency to  disregard  the  force  of  cases  that  manifests  itself  in  ways  too  various  to 
mention  or  illustrate. 

(2)  Mood  and  Tense  :  The  infinitive  is  used  to  express  purpose,  morbis  nos- 
tris  medere  venturus  erat,  6,  5;  veni  nuntiare  dominae  meae,  7,  15  ;  nisi  ipse  eum 
descendisset  redemere,  6,  5  ;  where  a  reminiscence  of  the  Greek  construction  of  the 
Vulgate  is  evident.  The  infinitive  is  usually  replaced  by  the  finite  verb  with  qtiod, 
quia,  quoniam  in  principal  clauses  of  the  indirect  discourse.  The  indicative  and 
subjunctive  are  used  without  distinction  in  indirect  questions,  meminiat  qtiantae 
stranges  fuere,  quae  amis  oppraeserit  humum,  praef.  2.  The  imperfect  and  plu- 
perfect tenses  tend  to  become  equivalent,  and  in  general  temporal  and  modal  rela- 
tions are  less  strictly  observed.  Participial  constructions  assume  great  importance 
— Chlogio — missis  exploratoribus — perlustrata  omnia  ^ipse  secutus  Romanos  proteret, 
2,  9. 

These  instances  illustrate  the  more  obvious  divergences  of  mediaeval  from  clas- 
sical Latin.  Barbarism  in  Latinity  is  a  relative  term,  however,  and  it  is  impossible 
to  set  an  exact  date  for  its  beginning.  It  was  a  matter  partly  of  individual  writ- 
ers as  well  as  of  age.  But  we  find  in  the  writings  of  Gregory  and  his  contempora- 
ies,  in  a  greater  or  less  degree,  most  of  the  faults  from  which  the  humanists  tried 
to  free  Latin  at  the  time  of  the  Renaissance.  We  must  remember,  however,  that 
the  literary  barrenness  of  the  Middle  Ages  was  due  primarily  to  the  poverty  of 
thought  that  begot  poverty  of  expression,  to  the  lack  of  mental  discipline  that  man- 
ifested itself  in  paratactic  sentences  and  slovenly  orthography ;  and  it  needed  only 
a  change  in  these  conditions  to  restore  Latin  to  something  of  its  former  beauty 
and  symmetry. 

The  ruin  of  Latin  after  the  time  of  Gregory  seems  to  have  been  speedy  and 
complete.  The  royal  capitularies  and  charters  of  this  period  testify  as  much  for 
the  official  language,*  while  the  character  of  the  literature  that  followed  is  well 

*A  fairly  representative  passage  of  the  barbarian  legal  Latin,  though  better  than  that  of  the 
Franks,  is  the  following  from  the  (Lombard)  Edict  of  Rotharus,  328:   M.  G,  H.  leges,  iv,  page 


LATIN    OF   THE   MIDDLE    AGES.  1 3 

illustrated  in  both  form  and  content,  by  an  extract  from  the  life  of  Theodoric, 
quoted  by  Draeger  in  the  introduction  to  his  Syntax  :  *'  Rex  vero  vocavit  Euse- 
biuniy  praefectuin  urbis  Ticeni,  et  inaudito  Boetio  protulit  in  eum  sententiam. 
Qui  mox  in  agro  Calventino,  tibi  in  custodia  habebaiur,  misit  rex  et  fecit  occidi. 
Qui  accepta  corde  in  fronte  diutissitne  tortus  est,  ita  ut  oculi  eius  creparent.  Sic 
sub  tormenta  ad  ultimum  cum  fuste  occiditur. 

III. 

While  it  is  probably  impossible  to  determine  just  when  Latin  ceased  to  exist 
as  a  spoken  language  among  the  common  people,  we  have  evidence  that  it  lingered 
later  than  Gregory's  time  in  some  parts  of  the  Empire.  It  was  not  necessarily  in 
the  centres  of  culture,  however,  that  this  vulgar  patois  of  Latin  persisted  longest. 
Rather  the  very  reverse  was  true  in  most  instances.  The  dialects  of  Grisons  and 
Sardinia  are  still  those  that  resemble  most  closely  the  mother  tongue  of  the  Ro- 
mance languages.  Dante  calls  the  Sardinians  simiae  homines  from  their  imitation 
of  Latin.  But  the  question  of  peasant  dialects,  while  it  may  be  interesting  from 
the  standpoint  of  Romance  philology,  has  very  little  to  do  with  the  transmission  of 
literary  Latin  through  the  Middle  Ages,  ^^^lat  we  are  concerned  with  is  the  ex- 
tent to  which  Latin  was  understood  by  people  who,  even  though  illiterate  or  nearly 
so,  on  account  of  their  position  in  social  and  economic  life  correspond  in  a  general 
way  to  what  we  now  sometimes  term  the  reading  classes — townspeople  and  small 
landholders,  traders  and  the  better  class  of  artisans  and  craftsmen,  the  Canterbury 
pilgrims  of  the  latter  half  of  the  first  decade  of  Christian  centuries.  It  is  natural 
to  suppose  that  people  of  this  class  understood  Latin  and  contmued  to  employ  it 
occasionally,  long  after  it  had  ceased  to  be  the  ordinary  medium  of  communication. 

Latin  continued  throughout  the  Middle  Ages  to  be  the  language  of  the  Church 
liturgy,  the  law  courts,  and  of  both  religious  and  secular  instruction.  In  other 
words,  it  remained,  if  not  the  mother  tongue,  at  least  the  adopted  mother  tongue  of 
all  the  professional  and  official  classes.  This  much,  of  course,  is  beyond  question. 
How  far  it  remained  the  vehicle  for  a  popular  literature  during  the  early  Middle 
Ages,  before  the  vernacular  tongue  had  taken  its  place,  is  less  certain.  Accentual 
rhythm  and  rhyme  became  thoroughly  established  in  literary  Latin,  upon  the  same 
footing  as  classic  metre,  through  the  influence  of  the  Christian  hymns.  But  it  is 
probable  that  contemporaneous  with  and  antedating  this — that  is  before  the  fall  of 
the  Western  Empire — there  was  an  equally  vigorous  and  voluminous  popular  Latin 
literature  of  secular  songs  and  rhythms.*  In  distant  provinces,  like  Britain,  if  this 
ever  gained  a  good  foothold  it  soon  disappeared.  The  literature  of  the  Celtic 
bards  had  begun  as  early  as  the  time  of  Gildas,  the  ineptas  saecularium  hominum 

276,  Si  anunalis  alienum  animaletn  occiderit  aut  intricaverit ,  id  est  bovis  bovem  aut  quibuslt- 
bet peculiis,  tunc  dofttinus  qui  animalent  suum  intricato  invenerit  aut  /orsan  iam  tnarcitant 
aut  minuatam,  iubetnus  ut  ille — qui  animaletn  suum  intricatum  aut  /orsitan  vtortuum  in- 
venit — ut  det  eum  apud  ilium  cuius  animalis  eum  intricavit,  et  recipiat  similem  qualis  tn  ilia 
ditfuit  quandofra^atus  est,  ab  ipso  cuius  animalis  hocfuit.  Note  the  difficulty  that  the  writer 
of  the  law  had  with  his  antecedents  and  subordinate  sentences,  something  characteristic  of  the  un- 
trained thinking  of  a  rude  age. 

*  The  classical  references  to  the  popular  songs  of  the  Romans  are  given  by  Muratori,  Ant. 
Ital.  Dissertatio  XLma.  A  collection  of  those  extant  is  to  be  found  in  du  Meril,  Poesies  Popu- 
laires  Latines  anterieures  au  Xllme  Siecle. 


14  MEDIAEVAL   AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

fabulas  of  the  sixty-sixth  section  of  his  Epistola.  In  the  previous  century  Latin 
had  practically  disappeared  from  the  Rhine  country  and  the  Lowlands,*  and 
though  we  learn  from  Gregory  that  it  was  spoken  at  Orleans  much  later, f  the  La- 
tin of  Southern  Gaul  in  the  sixth  century  was  probably  a  rustic  dialect,  to  whose 
speakers  the  classical  Latin  of  the  Ciceronian  period  would  have  been  wholly  un- 
intelligible, at  least  as  a  spoken  language,  J  for  we  must  remember  that  changes 
of  pronunciation  had  been  introduced  which  rendered  the  complex  structure  of  the 
Roman  sentence  ambiguous,  and  the  vocabulary  had  been  so  modified  as  to  give 
an  entirely  new  cast  and  color  to  the  colloquial  speech.  But  Latin  was  still 
spoken,  and  we  learn  from  a  life  of  St.  Caesarius  that  in  this  same  century  the  laity 
were  accustomed  to  take  part  in  the  Church  service  at  Aries  in  both  Latin  and 
Greek.  ^  By  the  time  of  Charlemagne,  however,  two  centuries  later,  the  Church 
songs  had  become  so  corrupted  that  teachers  had  to  be  imported  from  Italy  to  train 
the  Gallic  choirs,  ||  and  we  have  references  to  a  popular  literature  in  the  vulgar 
tongue.^  It  is  probable  that  Latin  ceased  to  be  understood  by  the  laity  in  Gaul  in 
the  seventh  century — that  is  popular  and  Church  Latin  ;  for  classical  Latin  must 
have  been  growing  more  and  more  of  a  puzzle  to  the  average  burgher  for  the  past 
three  centuries.** 

In  Italy,  however,  there  was  for  some  time  no  distinct  vernacular  tongue  to 
take  the  place  of  Latin.  Italy  was  also  nearest  the  head  of  official  Latin,  the 
Roman  Curia.  Classical  traditions  and  institutions  were  still  preserved.  It  is 
probable  that  a  popular  Latin  literature  lingered  later  here  that  elsewhere. 

Dante's  characterization  of  the  Roman  dialect  as  Italorum  vulgarium  omnium 

♦  Sidon.  Apol.  Epist.,  4,  17;  P.  L.,  LVIII,  and  M.  G.  H.  scant.,  vol.  viii,  Serntonis  povtj>a 
Romani,  si  qua  adhuc  uspiatn  est,  Belgicis  olim  sive  Rhenanis  abolita  terris. 

f  Cf.  note  page, 

X  Praef.  H.  F.:  quia  philosophantem  rhetor etn  intellegunt  pauci,  loquentem  rusticum 
multi.  Even  a  century  earlier  Sidonius  Apollinaris  had  said,  Ep.  2,  10;  P.  L.,  LVIII,  486,  B  ; 
and  M.  G.  H.  sc.  Ant.,  viii:  Tantum  increbuit  inutitudo  desidiosorunt  ut,nisi  vel paucissimi 
quique  merjint  latiaris  linguae  proprietatem  de  trivialiuni  barbarismoriun  robigine  vindi- 
caveritis,  eajti  breve  abolitam  deflea7nus  interita7nque  ;  sic  omnium  nobiliunt  sermonum  pur- 
pura per  incuriam  vulgi  decolorabantur. 

g  Red.  Ill,  384;  Adiecit  et  am.  atque  compulit  ut  laicorum. popularitas  psalmos  et  hymnos 
pareret,  alatque  et  tnodulata  voce,  instar  clericorum,  alii  Graece  alii  Latine  prosas  anti 
phonasque  cantarent,  ut  non  haberent  spatium  in  ecclesia/abtdis  occupari.  This  was  about  510. 
The  reference  to  the  /dbulae  may  refer  to  popular  songs  and  tales ;  for  we  thus  find  a  similar 
abuse  as  it  was  considered,  had  grown  up  in  Italy  in  the  ninth  century.  From  the  reference  to 
the  three  languages  spoken  at  Orleans  in  the  quotation  from  Gregory  given  above,  p.  9,  and  the 
passage  just  quoted  one  is  led  to  infer  that  the  case  of  intercommunication  and  extensive  com- 
mercial intercourse  between  the  different  parts  of  the  Empire  during  the  later  imperial  period 
had  given  rise  to  a  melange  of  tongues  and  peoples  in  the  trading  cities  of  Gaul  similar  to  that 
in  the  Levant  at  the  present  day. 

II  Rec.  V,  185  ;  Franci  naturali  voce  barbarica  frangentes  in  guttere  voces  potius  quam 
experimentes. 

^  We  also  know  that  there  was  a  native  literature  by  Charlemagne's  time,  probably  both 
Germanic  and  Romance.  The  former  is  referred  to  by  the  barbara  et  antiquissivia  car- 
tnina,  quibus  veterum  regum  actus  ac  bella  canebantur.  A  note  in  du  Meril,  page  234  of  the 
Poesies  Populaires  Latines  anterieures  au  Xllme  Siecle  gives  the  sources  for  early  vernacular 
songs. 

**  Monceaux,  Rev.  des  deux  Mondes.  Huttet  goes  much  further  in  his  views  of  the  modifica- 
tion of  the  spoken  speech:  si  I' on  av  ait  pare  cotnme  Seneque  ou  comme  Tacite,  on  n'  aurait  pas 
Hi  compris  dans  les  rues  de  Rotne.  Monceaux  is  here  speaking  of  the  time  of  the  Antonines. 


LATIN    OF   THE   MIDDLE    AGES.  1 5 

turpissimtim  very  possibly  indicates  that  even  by  his  time  the  speech  of  the  Roman 
populace  had  not  entirely  freed  itself  from  the  exuviae  of  corrupted  Latin  idioms 
and  grammatical  forms.  As  late  as  963,  at  the  council  held  in  Rome  by  Otto  I. 
to  depose  Pope  John  XII.,  Luitprand,  Bishop  of  Cremona,  rendered  into  Latin  the 
Saxon  speech  of  the  emperor  for  the  benefit  of  all  the  Romans — Romanis  omni- 
bus— present.  *  Poggio,  in  his  Historia  Convivialis,  mentions  the  fact  that  Latin 
was  spoken  by  the  women  of  Rome  in  his  day,  and  that  he  had  learned  from  them 
Latin  words  not  known  to  him  before. 

In  the  vicinity  of  Naples  also,  where  the  Greek  dominion  lingered  late  and  in- 
tercourse with  the  East  continued  active, f  Latin  may  have  been  spoken,  or  at  least 
understood  by  the  middle  classes  as  late  as  the  ninth  century.  Though  the  evi- 
dence is  a  little  slender,  we  are  led  to  infer  this  from  the  existence  of  a  popular 
ballad  dating  from  about  the  year  872,  written  in  a  Latin  that  is  rapidly  assuming 
a  modern  form.  The  very  barbarism  of  the  language,  and  the  feeling  and  dra- 
matic energy  of  the  piece — of  which  a  portion  only  has  been  preserved — indicate 
that,  though  probably  written  by  a  member  of  the  clerical  order,  it  was  doubtless 
intended  for  a  popular  auditory.  This  may  be  the  last  surviving  fragment  of  a  pop- 
ular literature  that  one  likes  to  imagine  as  dating  back  as  far  as  the  days  of  Horatius 
Codes  and  the  battle  of  Lake  Regillus.  The  only  evidence  of  mediaeval  construc- 
tion, apart  from  the  language  of  course,  is  the  abecedarium  arrangement  of  the 
line  initials.  Louis  the  Second,  son  of  Lothair,  was  imprisoned  by  one  of  his  vas- 
sals at  Beneventum,  while  returning  from  an  expedition  against  the  Saracens.  The 
minstrel,  if  we  may  so  call  the  author,  thus  expressed  his  indignation  at  an  act  that 
was  to  him  almost  a  sacrilege  : 

*  *  Audite  omnes  fines  terrae  orore  cum  tristiiia, 

Quale  scelus  fuit  factum  Benevento  civitas. 

Lhudovicum  compretiderunt  sancto  pio  augusto, 
Beneventani  se  adunarunt  ad  unum  consilitim. 

Adalferio  loquebantur  et  dicebant  principi  : 

**  Si  nos  eum  vivum  dimittejuus,  certe  nos peribimus. 
(^s)Ce/us  magnum  preparavit  in  istam  provintiam  ; 

Regnum  nostrum  nobis  tollit ;  nos  habet pro  nihilum. 

Plures  mala  nobis  fecit.     Rectum  est  ut  moriad."  X 

Muratori  also  quotes  a  watch  song,  sung  by  the  soldiers  in  the  defense  of  Mo- 
dena  from  the  Huns,  about  half  a  century  later.  The  Latin  is  better,  the  resem- 
blance to  Church  hymns  more  apparent,  and  the  popular  character  less  evident. 
The  opening  lines  are  : 

*  Concliorutn  Totnus  XXI.  {1644)  contains  the  proceedings  of  this  council  in  brief:  His 
auditis  Imperator,  quia  Romane  euis  loguelatn,  id  est  Saxonicam,  intelligere  interpreprando, 
Cremonense  episcopo,  praecepit  ut  Latino  sennone  haec  Romanis  omnibus  qua  nequibant 
sequnuten  exprimeret.  Besides  the  clergy  and  nobles  there  were  present  Benedictus  cum  Bul- 
garneno  filio  ex plebe,  Petr usque  et  imperiola  est  dictus,  cum  omni  Romanorum  militia. 

fit  must  be  remembered  that  Naples  retained  her  independence  from  the  time  of  Justinian  to 
the  end  of  the  twelfth  century. 

X  This  was  first  published  by  Muratori  at  the  end  of  his  forty -fourth  dissertation,  De  Rhythfnica 
(Ant.  Ital.).  A  translation  is  given  by  Fauriel,  o.  c,  II,  page  345.  The  poem  is  also  found  in 
du  Meril,  o.  c,  page  264,  under  the  title.  Chanson  des  Soldats  de  Louis  H. 


1 6  MEDIEVAL   AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

**  Oh^  tu,  qui  servas  arniis  ista  moema, 
Noli  dormire,  moneo,  sed  vigila  ; 
Dum  Hector  vigil  exstitit  in  Troia, 
JVon  earn  cepit fraudulenta  Graecia.^''  * 

It  is  not  necessary  to  suppose,  however,  that  military  songs  or  Church  songs,  even 
though  sung  by  the  people  at  large,  imply  the  colloquial  use  of  Latin  in  every-day 
life.  It  is  probable  that  songs,  the  chorus  of  which  at  least  was  Latin,  were  sung 
by  the  soldiers  dvu-ing  the  Crusades,  f 

/  It  is  probable  then  that  Latin  was  well  enough  understood  by  the  middle 
classes  of  Italy  as  late  as  the  tenth  century,  to  make  a  quasi  popular  literature  in 
'  that  language  possible.  There  was,  however,  a  vulgar  dialect,  probably  neither 
Italian  or  Latin,  but  something  between  the  two,  that  formed  the  conversational 
medium  of  the  Italians  during  this  period,  while  Latin  was  spoken  with  at  least 
an  intelligent  attempt  at  grammatical  correctness  by  the  better  educated  class  of 
monks  and  other  ecclesiastics.  J  Legal  and  Church  Latin  must  have  continued  to  be 
familiar  to  the  great  body  of  the  townspeople  and  country  aristocracy  much  longer, 
through  the  influence  of  the  law  courts  and  the  Church  liturgy.  We  shall  have 
occasion  to  note  later  that  Latin  seems  to  have  been  just  giving  way  to  the  vernac- 
ular dialects  in  court  literature  at  the  time  of  Dante.  When  we  consider,  how- 
ever, what  a  number  of  Latin  phrases,  such  as  sine  die,  botiafide,  ex  tempore, 
have  made  themselves  at  home  even  in  our  own  language,  it  becomes  easier  for 
us  to  realize  to  what  a  large  extent  the  simpler  colloquial  forms  of  Latin,  and  the 
technical  terms  of  the  Church  and  the  court  room  must  have  been  understood 
even  by  the  illiterate  classes  in  Italy  at  a  time  when  their  own  tongue  still  re- 
tained a  vivid  consciousness  of  its  own  immediate  descent  from  that  language.  It 
is  a  question,  however,  whether  this  very  fact,  that  Italian  and  Latin  were  so 
closely  related,  did  not  oftentimes  favor  the  introduction  of  vulgar  idioms  and  bar- 
barous terms  into  the  literary  language.  Gonzon  seems  to  imply  this  in  his  de- 
fense, and  Erasmus,  many  centuries  later,  considers  that  affinity  of  tongues  is  an 
obstacle  to  purity  of  diction.^  Be  this  as  it  may,  we  see  very  little  evidence  of 
Latin  letters  having  received  any  strain  of  natural,  native  vigor  through  the  longer 
continuance  of  Latin  as  a  spoken  tongue  in  Italy.  In  many*respects  the  Italian 
style  was  better,  on  account  of  the  earlier  recovery  or  continued  study  of  secular 
letters  south  of  the  Alps.     If  Latin  in  literature  received  any  inspiration  from  the 

*  The  whole  poem  is  found  in  du  Meril,  o.  c,  page  268. 

f  Of  this  sort  probably  was  the  song  Ultreia  {ultra  eia)  mentioned  by  Fauriel,  o.  c,  II;  Du 
Meril,  o.  c.,297,  gives  a  Chant  pour  la  premiere  Croisade  ;  other  crusade  songs  are  also  given 
on  pages  408-415  of  the  same  work. 

J  We  infer  this  from  the  anecdote  related  of  Gonzon  (Martenne,  Amplzsslma  Collectio,  I, 
2g7)  an  Italian  ecclesiastic,  who  was  summoned  to  attend  Otto  I,  in  Germany,  upon  some  special 
mission,  about  the  year  960.  He  was  entertained  at  the  monastery  of  St,  Gall  while  on  this  trip, 
and  in  the  course  of  his  conversation  with  the  monks  chanced  to  use  an  accusative  where  the 
strict  Latin  rule  requires  the  dative.  He  was  unmercifully  ridiculed  by  his  hosts  for  this  solecism 
and  defended  himself  later  in  a  long  letter  in  which  he  says,  Falso  putavit  Sancti  Galli  monachus 
Tne  revtotum  a  scientia  granimaticae  artis,  licet  aliquanto  retarder  usu  nostrae  vulgaris  lin- 
guae, quae  Latinitati  vicina  est. 

§  Videtur  affinitas  obstare puritati.  Citius  enint  pure  Rotnane  loquetur  Hibernus  quant 
Gallus  aut  Hispanus. 


LATIN    OF    THE    MIDDLE     AGES.  1 7 

people  in  Italy,  it  is  to  be  found  in  the  Christian  hymns.     As  a  rule  it  was  as  arti- 
ficial here  as  everywhere,  more  so  perhaps  than  in  the  Anglo-Saxon  schools.* 

IV. 

When,  after  the  long  reign  of  anarchy  in  the  North,  political  conditions  again 
gave  encouragement  and  inspiration  to  literature,  a  concomitant  change  for  the 
better  is  also  noticeable  in  the  language.  The  Carolingian  Age  marks  a  sharp  di- 
vision in  the  literary  history  of  Latin.  That  language  had  ceased  to  be  spoken  by 
the  people,  which  is  but  another  way  of  saying  that  it  had  ceased  to  be  modified 
by  colloquial  usage.  Its  period  of  endogenous  transformation  was  past.  There 
was  no  longer  to  be  a  growth  of  new  words  based  directly,  and  of  new  gram- 
matical forms  based  indirectly,  upon  principles  of  vocalization.  Popular  literature 
in  that  language  had  ceased.  It  had  become  a  book  language,  and  though  as  such 
still  living,  and  undergoing  modification  in  accordance  with  linguistic  laws,  the 
character  of  this  modification  received  its  stamp  from  the  caste  by  which  the  lan- 
guage was  employed.  This  is  true  even  when,  as  we  shall  see  at  the  close  of  the 
period  of  scholastic  Latin  which  now  begins,  it  again  descends  into  the  streets, 
jostles  against  the  vulgar  tongues,  and  again  becomes  for  the  last  time  the  vehicle 
for  popular  song  and  story. 

The  literary  influence  of  the  Carolingian  Age  was  two-fold.  It  brought  learn- 
ing into  good  repute,  and  it  furnished  material  for  writers.  It  gave  men  something 
to  think  and  to  write  about,  and  inspired  the  Romance  literature  of  the  following 
centuries.  Saxon  in  its  origin,  Teutonic  in  its  temperament  and  character,  the 
Carolingian  influence  added  something  even  to  Latin  literature  that  it  could  not 
have  derived  from  any  classical  source.  Latin  had  lost  infinitely  more  than  it 
could  ever  recover  ;  but  the  infusion  of  new  elements  gave  it  features  that  it  never 
had  possessed  before. 

That  Saxon  influences  should  have  predominated  over  Italian  at  the  court  of 
Charles  was  probably  due  more  to  ethnic  sympathies  and  the  broader  and  more 
serious  culture  of  the  English  schools,  than  to  superiority  in  the  graces  of  rhetoric 
and  style  on  the  part  of  the  Northumbrian  monks.  In  fact  even  here  grammar 
seems  to  have  been  regarded  as  an  Italian  specialty.  But  literary  inspiration,  the 
enthusiasm  that  makes  learning  a  sort  of  cult,  had  been  strongest  in  England. 
It  is  often  attitude  toward  culture  as  much  as  culture  itself  that  makes  a  nation 
the  centre  of  a  literary  revival,  and  in  the  seventh  century  the  Renaissance  spirit 
was  strong  in  England,  and  weak  in  Italy. f 

The  reign  of  Charles  produced,  besides  a  theological  literature  of  imposing 
proportions,  a  vast  body  of  poetry,  epistles,  and  historical  writings,  all  based  more 
or  less  consciously  upon  classical  models.     This  reign  also  saw  the  first  attempt  to 

*  Bede,  in  his  History  of  the]  EngHsh^  I,  i,  names  Latin  as  one  of  the  five  languages  of 
Britain ;  and  this  statement  is  borrowed  without  modification  by  later  chroniclers.  We  hear  also 
of  an  English  bishop  who  spoke  Greek  and  Latin  as  fluently  as  his  native  tongue.  We  might  as- 
sume then  that  Latin  continued  to  be  a  sort  of  class  language  in  the  Hibfemo-Saxon  culture  area 
during  this  period  to  such  an  extent  that  no  distinction  was  drawn  between  it  and  the  vernacular 
as  a  living  language. 

t  The  principal  teacher  in  Italy  at  this  time  seems  to  have  been  Dungallus,  a  Scotch  or  Irish 
monk,  cf.  Muratori,  Diss.  XXIV»ia,  De Litterarutn  Statu  in  Italia  in  Seculis  IX  et  X. 


0 


1 8  MEDL^VAL   AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

I  restore  the  corrupted  text  of  the  Vulgate — the  earliest  essay,  so  far  as  we  know,  in 
j  the  history  of  Latin,  at  the  critical  restoration  of  a  literary  work.  The  conception 
of  the  reestablishment  of  the  Western  Empire,  a  perfectly  serious,  sober  thing  to 
the  men  who  took  part  in  trying  to  realize  it,  created  a  new  attitude  toward  Ro- 
man literature.  The  little  coterie  of  literary  men  at  the  court  of  Charles  donned 
Roman  names  along  with  their  other  imperial  fancies.  Alcuin  became  Flaccus, 
Angilbert  Homer,  and  a  writer  of  courtly  eclogues  has  left  no  other  name  to  pos- 
terity than  Naso. 

Alcuin  was  naturally  the  leader  of  this  revival.  Though  he  seems  to  have 
been  one  of  those  men  who  exercise  a  greater  influence  through  their  personality 
than  through  their  pen,  he  has  left  us  writings  that  are  voluminous — perhaps  un- 
necessarily so,  considering  their  contents — and  that  are  so  thoroughly  characteristic 
of  the  age  in  which  he  wrote  as  to  be  fairly  representative  of  the  whole  literature 
of  the  period.  His  prose  is  deformed  by  the  technical  and  abstract  cast  which  the- 
ology gave  to  literature  when  its  influence  was  not  modified  by  the  serious  rivalry 
of  any  other  form  of  letters,  and,  especially  in  his  correspondence,  by  the  never 
ending  complimentary  formulas  that  the  courtesy  of  the  time  demanded.  In 
other  words  we  have  the  beginning  of  the  scholastic  style.  Parallel  with  this 
there  is  something  that  impresses  a  modern  reader  as  being  cant,  an  overloading 
of  the  text  with  moral  reflections,  pious  exhortation  and  religious  admonitions  that 
are  very  tiresome  to  the  nineteenth  century  reader. 

There  is  one  feature  of  this  Teutonic  Latinity,  however,  that  is  not  altogether  un- 
interesting; and  that  is  the  peculiar  manifestation  of  the  Romantic  spirit  that  reveals 
itself  in  love  for  themes  treating  of  outdoor  life,  and  especially  of  spring.  Roman 
Latin  was  distinctively  urban,  and  when  it  did  venture  beyond  its  w^alls  it  was 
only  to  take  a  practical  utilitarian,  de  re  rustica  survey  of  the  surrounding  fields 
and  meadows.  Romanticism  in  the  form  of  an  emphasis  of  subjectivity  through 
solitude  and  an  environment  of  nature — though  suggested  occasionally  in  mediaeval 
literature,  especially  in  the  writings  of  St.  Bernard — first  definitively  enters  Latin 
literature  with  Petrarch.  But  the  following,  from  Alcuin,  almost  reminds  us  of 
Chaucer  in  its  buoyant  spring  joyousness  : 

Nunc  cuculus  ramis  etiam  resonavit  in  altis ; 
Florea  versicolor  pariet  nunc  germina  tellus  ; 
Vinea  bachiferas  trudit  de  palmite  gemmas, 
Suscitat  et  vario  nostras  modulamine  mentes 
Indefessa  satis  rutulis  luscinia  ruscis. 

Another  poem  sometimes  ascribed  to  Alcuin,^  and  more  Romantic  than  clas- 
sical in  its  spirit,  is  interesting  as  the  first  example  we  have  of  a  disputation  in 
verse — one  of  the  means  by  which  scholasticism  later  invaded  the  realm  of  poetry. 
It  is  given  entire,  not  only  because  it  represents  the  best  Latin  verse  written  at  this 
period,  but  also  because  it  illustrates  the  Germanic  attitude  which  the  poet  assumed 
toward  his  theme. 

*It  was  formerly  ascribed  to  Bede  or  to  Milo,  and  later,  by  Ebert,  o.  c,  II,  68,  to  Dodo. 
Diimmler  thinks  it  was  addressed  to  Dodo.  Cf.  Zeitschrift  fur  Deut.  Alt.,  XII,  448;  Rhein. 
Mus.,  XXX,  621-28. 


'^  r 


or  -TAX 


UKIVERSITT 


S>P 


CALlFQl^ 


HV&^ 


LATIN    OF    THE    MIDDLE     AGES- 


19 


CONFLICTUS  VeRIS  ET  HiEMIS. 

Conveniunt  subito  cuncti  de  montibus  altis 
Pastores  pecudum  vernali  luce  sub  umbra 
Arborea,  pariter  laetas  celebrare  Camenas. 
Adfuit  et  iuvenis  Dafnis  seniorque  Palaemon ; 
Omnes  hi  cuculo  laudes  cantare  parabant. 
Ver  quoque  florigero  succinctus  stemmate  venit, 
Frigida  venit  Hiems,  rigidis  hirsuta  capillis. 
His  certamen  erat  cuculi  de  carmine  grande. 
Ver  prior  adlusit  ternos  modulamine  versus. 

Ver:   "Opto  mens  veniat  cu cuius,  carissimus  ales, 
Omnibus  iste  solet  fieri  gratissimus  hospes 
In  tectis,  modulans  rutulo  bona  carmina  rostro." 

Tum  glacialis  Hiems  respondit  voce  severa  : 

Hiems  :  *'  Non  veniat  cuculus,  nigris  sed  dormiat  antris. 
Iste  famera  secum  semper  portare  suescit." 

Ver:  "Opto  meus  veniat  cuculus  cum  germine  laeto, 
Frigora  depellat,  Phoebo  comes  almus  in  aevum. 
Phoebus  amat  cuculum  crescenti  luce  serena." 

Hiems  :  **  Non  veniat  cuculus,  generat  qui  forte  labores, 
Proelia  congeminat,  requiem  disiungit  amatam, 
Omnia  disturbat ;  pelagi  terraeque  laborant." 

Ver:  "Quid  tu,  tarde  Hiems,  cuculo  convicia  cantas? 
Qui  torpore  gravi  tenebrosis  tectus  in  antris 
Post  epulas  Veneris,  post  stulti  pocula  Bacchi — " 

Hiems :  ' '  Sunt  mihi  divitiae,  sunt  et  convivia  laeta, 
Est  requies  dulcis,  calidus  est  ignis  in  aede. 
Haec  cuculus  nescit,  sed  perfidus  ille  laborat." 

Ver :  "Ore  feret  flores  cuculus  et  mella  ministrat, 
Aedificatque  domos,  placidas  et  navigat  undas, 
Et  generat  suboles,  laetos  et  vestiet  agros." 

Hiems  :  **  Haec  inimica  mihi  sunt,  quae  tibi  laeta  videntur. 
Sed  placet  optatas  gazas  numerare  per  areas 
Et  gaudere  cibis  simul  et  requiescere  semper." 

Ver  :  "  Quis  tibi,  tarde  Hiems,  semper  dormire  paratus, 
Divitias  cumulat,  gazas  vel  congregat  ullas. 
Si  ver  vel  aestas  ante  tibi  nulla  laborant?  " 

Hiems  :  "  Vera  refers  :  illi,  quoniam  mihi  multa  laborant, 
Sunt  etiam  servi  nostra  ditione  subacti, 
lam  mihi  servantes  domino,  quaecumque  laborant." 


2  0  MEDIAEVAL   AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

Ver  :  "  Non  illis  dominus,  sed  pauper  inopsque  superbus, 
Nee  te  iam  poteris  per  te  tu  pascere  tantum, 
Ni  tibi  qui  veniet  cuculus  alimonia  praestet." 

Turn  respondit  ovans  sublimi  e  sede  Palaemon 
Et  Dafnis  pariter,  pastorum  et  turba  piorum : 

*'  Desine  plura,  Hiems  ;  rerum  tu  prodigus,  atrox, 
Et  veniat  cuculus,  pastorum  dulcis  amicus. 
Collibus  in  nostris  erumpant  germina  laeta, 
Pascua  sint  pecori,  requies  et  dulcis  in  arvis, 
Et  virides  rami  praestent  umbracula  fessis, 
Uberibus  plenis  veniantque  ad  mulctra  capellae, 
Et  volucres  varia  Phoebum  sub  voce  salutent. 
Quapropter  citius  cuculus  nunc  ecce  venito  ! 
Tu  iam,  dulcis  amor,  cunctis  gratissimus  hospes, 
Omnia  te  expectant,  pelagus,  tellusque  polusque, 
Salve,  dulce  decus,  cuculus  per  saecula  salve  !  " 

There  is  more  than  occasionally  an  echo  from  Vergil  or  Horace  in  the  poem. 
His  certamen  erat  ctictdi  de  carmine  grande  was  suggested  by  Et  certanien  erat, 
Corydon  cum  Thyrside,  magnum  of  the  seventh  eclogue  ;  Desine  plura,  Hiems, 
has  its  parallel  in  Desine  plura,  puer,  which  Vergil  uses  in  both  the  fifth  and  the 
ninth  eclogue  ;  glacialis  hiems  occurs  also  in  the  third  Aeneid,  line  285.  The  first 
ode  of  Horace,  of  the  first  book,  opens  with  dulce  decus,  which  appears  in  the  last 
line  of  the  Conjlictus,  and  ad  mulctra  capellae  is  found  in  the  sixteenth  epode. 
But  these  show  really  little  more  than  vague,  unintentional  reminiscences.  On  the 
other  hand,  nearly  half  of  the  lines  are  leonine,  some  with  complete  rhymes — ru- 
iilo  bona  carmina  rostro  ;  nigris  sed  dormiat  antt^  ;  laetos  et  vestiet  agros ;  pas- 
torum et  turba  piorzim.*  There  is  also  the  Saxon  love  of  alliteration  ;  secum 
semper  portare  suescit ;  cuculo  convicia  cantas  ;  Nee  te  iam  poteris  per  te  tu  pascere 
tantum.  Furthermore,  the  first  sentence,  the  first  three  lines  of  the  poem,  is 
bound  together  by  two  leonines  and  two  series  of  alliteration.  This  is  sufficient 
to  show  perhaps  how  thoroughly  Teutonic  in  structure  the  Latin  verse  of  the  Car- 
olingian  period  is,  and  how  slightly  the  literary  influence  of  Italy  was  felt  by  the 
writers  of  the  North.  But  the  whole  spirit  of  the  poem,  the  idea  of  the  disputa- 
tion, the  personification  of  spring  and  winter,  the  association  of  the  cuckoo  with 
spring,  the  allusions  to  treasures  and  dark  caverns,  the  connection  of  winter  with 
banquets  and  a  warm  fire,  with  comfort  and  physical  ease,  and  of  spring  with 
labor  and  battle  and  voyages,  are  all  Teutonic,  and  are  ideas  that  received  their 
emphasis  first  in  the  literature  of  the  northern  lands.  The  fact  that  they  determine 
the  tone  and  color  of  Carolingian  poetry  shows  that  the  ninth  century  revival  was 
not  merely  an  imitative  one,  like  that  in  Italy  four  centuries  later,  but  was  one 
pregnant  with  original  impulse,  with  an  entirely  new  range  of  literary  concepts, 
which  never  found  complete  expression  in  Latin,  but  was  fully  realized  only  with 
the  maturity  of  the  vernacular  literature. 

As  has  already  been  intimated,  Alcuin's  importance  as  a  teacher  was  greater 

*  For  this  reason  I  should  read  cunctis  in  the  first  line. 


/ 


LATIN    OF    THE    MIDDLE     AGES.  21 

than  as  a  writer.  He  carried  to  the  palace  school  of  Charles  and  the  mon- 
astery of  Tours  the  learning  that  had  survived  in  Ireland  and  Northumbria  during 
the  time  when  barbarian  invasion  and  political  confusion  had  swept  it  away  from 
western  Europe.  Even  some  knowledge  of  Greek  was  kept  alive  in  this  northern 
retreat,*  and  there  was  a  vein  of  reasonably  good  Latin  running  through  the  culture 
which  the  English  monastic  schools,  transmitted  through  Bede, Egbert,  and  Aelbert 
to  the  York  scholar  ;f  which  was  so  to  speak  domiciled  by  him  at  Tours,  and 
carried  on  later,  by  way  of  Fulda,  through  various  channels  to  St.  Gall,  where 
many  a  classic  author  slept  for  centuries  before  being  awakened  by  the  spring  sim- 
shine  of  the  Renaissance.     Alcuin  thus  sums  up  the  literary  treasures  of  York  : 

Illic  invenies  veterum  vestigia  patrum, 
Quidquid  habet  pro  se  Latino  Romanus  in  orbe, 
Graecia  vel  quidquid  transmisit  clara  Latinis, 
Hebraeicus  vel  quod  populus  bibit  imbre  superno, 
Africa  lucipluo  vel  quidquid  lumine  sparsit : 
Quod  pater  Hieronumus,  quod  sensit  Hilarius  atque 
Ambrosius  praesul,  simul  Augustinus  et  ipse 
Sanctus  Athanasius,  quod  Orsius  edit  avitus  ; 
Quidquid  Gregorius  summus  docet  et  Leo  papa ; 
Basilius  quidquid  ;    Fulgentius  atque  coruscant 
Cassiodorus  item,  Chrysostomus  atque  lohannes  ; 
Quidquid  et  Althelmus  docuit,  quid  Beda  magister, 
Quae  Victorinus  scripsere  Boetius  atque  ; 
Historici  veteres,  Pompeius,  Plinius,  ipse 
Acer  Aristoteles,  rhetor  quoque  Tullius  ingens  ; 
Quid  quoque  Sedulius,  vel  quid  canit  ipse  luvencus, 
Alcimus  et  Clemens,  Prosper,  Paulinus,  Arator  ; 
Quid  Fortunatus,  vel  quid  Lactantius  edunt ; 
Quae  Maro  Virgilius,  Statius,  Lucanus  et  auctor 
Artis  grammaticae  vel  quid  scripsere  magistri, 
Quid  Probus  atque  Focas,  Donatus  Priscianusve, 
Servius,  Euticius,  Pompeius,  Comminianus. 

Alcuin,  as  we  have  seen,  was  familiar  with  Horace  also.  The  fact  that  he  is 
not  mentioned  here,  and  that  Ovid,  whose  Ars  Amatoria  (I,  91)  suggested  the 
first  line  of  this  very  quotation,  is  overlooked,  was  probably  due  to  an  oversight  or 
to  the  difficulty  of  working  them  into  the  metre  ;  for  we  can  hardly  assume  that 
they  were  to  be  found  only  upon  the  Continent  at  this  time,  and  had  they  been  in 
England  they  doubtless  would  have  been  at  York.  This  list,  however,  is  as  ex- 
pressive on  account  of  its  arrangement  and  for  what  it  lacks  as  for  what  it  con- 
tains.    The  Church  Fathers,  naturally,  come  first ;   Cicero  is  commended  as  a 

*  In  the  Chronicon  Florentii  Wigomiensis ,  anno  726  P.  C.  Tobias  Hrofensis,  ecclesiae 
praesul,  de/unctus  est,  qui  ita  Graecam  cum  Latina  didicit  linguatn,  ut  tarn,  notas  ac  fatntl- 
iares  sibi  eas  quam  naturialis  suae,  id  est  Anglicae,  loquelavi  haberet.     M.  H.  B.  I.,  541  D. 

fCf,  Bede,  in  M.  H.  B.  I.,  109  A:  Quinque  gentium  Unguis  {ietenetur  Britanni)  An- 
glorum,  Brittonum,  Scotorum,  Pictorum,  Latinorum,  quae  meditatione  scripturarum  ceteris 
omnibus  est  facta  communis. 


2  2  MEDI/EVAL   AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

master  of  style  ;  the  other  authors  are  mixed  in  an  inextricable  jumble  to  suit  the 
demands  of  the  measure,  without  any  attempt  either  direct  or  indirect  to  express  a 
literary  judgment  upon  them.  To  Alcuin  apparently  they  were  upon  the  same 
plane,  and  he  formed  no  critical  opinion,  according  to  classical  or  modem  .criteria 
at  least,  as  to  their  relative  importance.  There  is  a  hint  in  Alcuin' s  work  on  or- 
thography that  the  various  pronunciation  of  the  Late  Empire  had  been  perpetuated 
among  the  monks.  He  directs  them  to  write  vinea  with  an  i  in  the  first  syllable, 
and  e  in  the  second  when  vine  is  meant,  and  with  i  in  the  second  and  e  in  the  first 
when  pardon  is  intended  ;  to  commence  vacca  with  v  for  cow  and  b  for  berry  ;  and 
similarly  not  to  confound  vellus  and  bellus,  fd  and  vel^  beneficus  and  veneficus,  bibo 
and  vivo.'*' 

Though  Alcuin  wrote  in  the  midst  of  a  period  of  considerable  intellectual  activ- 
ity, neither  he  or  his  contemporaries  produced  anything  of  great  permanent  value 
from  a  purely  literary  point  of  view.  The  personality  of  the  writers  does  not  shine 
through  their  works.  Monasticism  and  ecclesiasticism  are  not  usually  favorable 
to  the  development  of  that  degree  of  individuality  and  mental  and  moral  indepen- 
dence which  is  necessary  in  order  that  genius  may  recognize  itself  or  receive  recog- 
nition from  others.  Alcuin  occasionally  wrote  something,  however,  that  came 
very  near  to  having  a  touch  of  true  poetry  about  it.  The  following  evening  prayer 
is  more  distinctively  Christian  in  its  spirit  than  anything  quoted  before,  and  there 
are  an  ease  and  an  appropriateness  in  the  expression  and  feeling  of  the  piece  that 
are  akin  to  literary  merit  if  not  to  poetic  inspiration  : 

Oratio  in  NocrE. 

Qui  placido  in  puppi  carpebat  pectore  somnum, 

Exurgens  ventis  imperat  et  pelago  : 
Fessa  labore  gravi  quamvis  hie  membra  quiescant, 

Ad  se  concedat  cor  vigilare  meum. 
Agne  Dei,  mundi  qui  crimina  cuncta  tulisti, 

Conserv^a  requiem  mitis  ab  hoste  meam. 

During  the  two  centuries  following  the  reign  of  Charles,  in  the  disorder  attend- 
ing the  last  great  invasion  from  the  north,  letters  suffered  a  second  eclipse,  though 
one  not  so  total  as  that  which  had  accompanied  the  anarchy  of  the  Merovingian 
period.  In  the  monasteries  the  classic  authors  were  still  read  and  studied,  and 
furnished  their  grist  of  centos  for  the  monkish  annalists  and  verse  makers.  A  fav- 
orite metre,  especially  for  those  metrical  lives  of  the  saints  that  formed  one  of  the 
staple  products  of  the  literary ,  activity  of  this  time,  was  the  leonine  hexameter, 
which  appeared  towards  the  close  of  the  ninth  century  with  a  one  syllabled  rhyme 
and  by  the  beginning  of  the  twelfth  century,  with  a  more  fully  developed  two  syl- 
lable rhyme,  became  the  predominant  form  of  verse.  One  scholastic  grammarian 
says  that  it  got  its  name  from  the  fact  thatj  like  the  lion,  its  principal  power  resided 
in  its  breast  and  its  tail.  It  was  a  rather  serious  matter  to  write  poetry  under  the 
restrictions  which  this  metre  imposed.  The  two  halves  of  the  hexameter  must 
rhyme,  no  hiatus  and  no  elision  were  allowed,  and  the  strictest  writers  apparently 

*  Keil,  Grammatici  Latini,  VII,  295  et  seq.  These  directions  are  partly  traditional,  of 
course,  and  are  copied  from  the  late  Latin  grammarians. 


LATIN    OF    THE    MIDDLE   AGES.  23 

admitted  no  spondaic  verses.  Of  course  writing  poetry  became  a  matter  of  clever- 
ness rather  than  of  inspiration  under  these  conditions.''^  A  poem  was  something 
like  those  acrostics  with  which  the  mediaeval  writers  amused  themselves,  or  the  in- 
genious letter  of  Petrarch,  which  can  be  read  either  backwards  or  forwards  with  a 
reversal  of  meaning.  Alliteration,  which  was  favored  by  the  Romans  themselves, 
especially  during  the  period  of  decadence,  and  was  still  more  popular  with  the 
Teutonic  nations,  was  forced  to  such  an  extent  as  to  add  still  further  to  the  artifi- 
ciality of  the  verse.  To  illustrate,  in  Theofridus'  s  metrical  life  of  Willibrodus  such 
examples  as  the  following  occur,  not  rarely  but  repeatedly : 

Sane  terit  Urram  non  tanto  tempore  tactam  (III,  76),  and  t€n  lines  farther  on, 
Mentem  maternam  mutans  imitata  novercam.  The  natural  result  was  that  rules 
of  metre  came  to  be  more  important  in  the  eyes  of  the  writers  than  rules  of  gram- 
mar ;  and  grammatical  correctness  was  consequently  sacrificed  to  the  demands  of 

the  verse,  t 

However,  these  metrical  lives  give  us  some  information  as  to  the  classical  works 
preserved  and  read  in  the  monasteries.  In  Theofridus  and  the  Vitae  Sanctorum\ 
we  find  centos  and  allusions  to  passages  in  the  following  profane  authors  :  Cicero, 
the  Phillipics  and  Catilinarian  orations,  de  Inventione,  de  Natura  Deorum  ;  Hor- 
ace, all  the  works  ;  Juvenal,  all  the  satires ;  Livy,  book  twenty-two  ;  Lucan  ; 
Lucretius  ;  Macrobius  ;  Martial  ;  Ovid,  all  the  works  ;  Persius,  Prologue  and 
satires  iii. ,  iv.,  and  v.;  Phaedrus  ;  Pliny,  Natural  History  ;  Propertius  ;  Sallust, 
the  Catiline  and  lugurtha  ;  Seneca,  the  Phaedra,  Hercules  Oetaeus,  de  Ira,  Epis- 
tles ;  Servius ;  Silius  Italicus  ;  Statins ;  Terence,  the  Adelphi  and  Eunuchus  ; 
Tibullus  ;  Valerius  Flaccus  ;  Vergil,  all  the  authentic  works. 


V. 

We  have  a  poem  written  in  the  first  half  of  the  tenth  century,  and  leaning  to 
the  classical  metres  in  form,  but  thoroughly  Teutonic  in  spirit,  that  in  some  ways 
indicates  the  high-water  mark  of  pure  literature  in  Mediaeval  Latin.  This  is  the 
epic  Waltharius,  though  founded  on  German  legend  in  its  Latin  form  a  youthful 
work  of  Ekkehart,  a  monk  and  later  abbot  of  St.  Gall.  An  intrinsically  interest- 
ing theme  is  treated  with  good  taste  and  dramatic  skill  and  vigor  in  Latin  which, 
though  far  from  classical,  never  fails  to  give  fitting  expression  to  the  thought. 
The  sentiment  of  the  piece  is  noble,  and  poetic  genius  hovers  over  it  even  where 
it  does  not  inspire  the  verse. 

Walter  of  Aquitane  is  a  hero  of  Teutonic  fiction,  dating  back  to  the  Niebelun- 
gen  times  and  to  the  court  of  Attila,  the  *'  Scourge  of  God,"  who,  though  he  may 
not  be  the  particular  monarch  figuring  in  this  story,  has  attracted  to  himself  or  im- 

*  Scholastic  distinctions  crept  into  prosody.  Hexameters  were  classified  as  consonantes, 
leonini,  caudati,  peractherici,  repercussivi,  pariles,  dactylici,  reciproci,  retrogradi,  concatenati, 
intercisi,  circulati,  and  citocadi.  Hubatsch,  op.  cit.,  7.  Some  of  these  terms  are  explained  in 
Thurot,  op.  cit. 

t  Indeed  these  wTiters  were  sometimes  ignorant  of  grammar,  or  at  least  frankly  acknowledged 
the  fact  that  they  disregarded  it,  like  Gregory  the  Great,  in  sacred  subjects;  "  Si  quis  movetur 
riisticitate  serfnonis  solecismorumque  inconcinnitatibus ,  qiias  minime  vitare  studui,  audiat 
quia  reg7tum  Deii  non  est  in  sermone,"  etc.,  quoted  by  Comparetti,  op.  cit.,  p.  88,  note  35. 

J  See  bibliography. 


24  MEDIEVAL   AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

parted  something  of  his  own  history  to  all  the  incidents  of  romance  that  gathered 
about  his  ancestors.  We  see  evidence  of  the  old  German  poem  or  poems  upon 
which  Ekkehart'  s  epic  is  based  in  the  simplicity  of  exposition. 

Tertia  pars  orbis,  fratres,  Europa  vocatur, 
Moribus  ac  linguis  varias  et  nomine  gentes 
Distinguens  cultu,  tum  religione  sequestrans  ; 
Inter  quas  gens  Pannoniae  residere  probatur, 
Quam  tamen  et  Hunnos  plerumque  vocare  solemus, 
Hie  populus  fortis  virtute  vigebat  et  armis, 
Non  circum  positas  solum  domitans  regiones, 
Littoris  Oceani  sed  pertransiverat  oras, 
Foedera  supplicibus  donans  sternensque  rebelles. 

Though  Grimm  calls  these  lines  *'■  bloss  monchisch,^^  oxid  fratres  certainly  sug- 
gests the  reader  in  the  refectorium,  the  simplicity  of  the  exordium  and  the  direct, 
unpretentious  beginning  add  charm  to  the  story,  especially  when  we  contrast  it 
with  the  elaborate  artificiality  of  scholastic  and  Renaissance  poetry.  There  is  no 
invocation  of  the  Muses,  no  classical  allusion,  no  pedantic  display  of  erudition  ; 
nor  are  we  suddenly  immersed  in  a  chill  cloistral  atmosphere  of  beads  and  miracles. 
We  are  going  to  hear  a  story,  with  more  of  the  ring  of  the  ballad  than  of  the 
stateliness  of  the  epic  in  it,  perhaps  ;  but  there  is  an  intimation  that  we  are  getting 
through  the  integument  and  down  to  the  quick  of  literature  again, 

Attila,  king  of  the  Huns,  wishing  to  renew  the  ancient  triumphs  of  his  race, 
gives  orders  to  advance  against  the  Franks,  whose  seat  of  power  at  this  time  was 
the  upper  valley  of  the  Rhine.  The  Prankish  king,  Gibicho,  terrified  by  reports 
of  the  hostile  army, 

cuneum 
Vincentem  numero  Stellas  atque  amnis  arenos, 

after  calling  a  council  of  the  nobles  decides  to  send  Attila  his  submission,  with  tri- 
bute, and,  as  the  young  prince  Guntharius  is  too  young  to  be  separated  from 
his  mother,  his  liegeman  Hagano  as  hostage.  Attila  accepts  the  submission  of  the 
Franks,  and  later  that  of  the  Burgundians  and  Aquitanians,  from  whom  come  as 
hostages  respectively  the  Princess  Hiltgund  and  Prince  Walter,  who  are  already 
betrothed  by  order  of  their  parents. 

Attila,  with  the  generous  magnanimity  of  a  hero  of  romance,  is  represented  as 
indulging  in  noble  sentiments,  and  preferring  peace  to  war — albeit  his  professions 
are  a  little  inconsistent  with  his  practices  : 

Foedera  plus  cupio  quam  proelia  mittere  vulgo. 
Pace  quidem  Hunni  malunt  regnare,  sed  armis 
Inviti  feriunt  quos  cernunt  esse  rebelles. 

The   young  hostages   are  brought  up  at  his  court  as  though  under  a  father's  care. 
Hagano  and  Waltharius,  trained  in  the  arts  of  war  and  the  schools  : 

Robore  vincebant  fortes,  animoque  sophistas, 
Donee  iam  cunctos  superarent  fortiter  Hunnos. 


LATIN    OF    THE    MIDDLE    AGES.  2$ 

Meanwhile  Hiltgunt,  who  is  under  the  care  of  the  queen,  wins  the  love  and 
confidence  of  her  mistress,  and  is  entrusted  with  the  care  of  the  treasure  chamber. 
In  the  course  of  time,  when  the  young  people  have  attained  maturity,  the  Prank- 
ish king  dies  and  Prince  Guntharius  ascends  the  throne.  As  he  refuses  to  pay 
further  tribute  to  the  Huns,  Hagano  flees  by  night  to  the  court  of  his  master. 

Warned  by  the  example  of  Hagano,  Attila,  upon  advice  of  the  queen,  strives 
to  attach  Waltharius  more  closely  to  himself  by  an  alliance  with  some  princess  of 
the  Huns.     The  royal  treasure  shall  eke  out  the  scanty  fortune  of  the  groom  : 

**  Amplificabo  quidem  pariter  te  rure  domique, 

Nee  quisquam,  qui  dat  sponsam,  post  facta  pudebit." 

Waltharius,  however,  has  already  conceived  a  passion  for  Hiltgunt,  and  manages 
to  evade  the  king's  unwelcome  generosity  upon  a  plea  of  devotion  to  public  duty  : 

"  Si  nuptam  accipiam  domini  praecepta  secundum, 
Vinciar  in  primis  curis  et  amore  puellae, 
Atque  a  servitio  regis  plerumque  retardor ; 
Aedificare  domos,  cultumque  intendere  ruris 
Cogor,  et  hoc  oculis  senioris  adesse  moratur, 
Et  solitam  regno  Hunnorum  impendere  curam. 
Namque  voluptatem  quisquis  gustaverit,  exin 
Intolerabilius  consuevit  ferre  laboves." 

Attila,  satisfied  as  to  the  fidelity  of  his  hostage,  ceases  to  urge  an  unwelcome 
wedlock  upon  him.  A  recently  conquered  vassal  tribe  rebels,  and  Waltharius 
leads  the  royal  army  against  them.  There  is  a  vivid  description  of  the  battle  ;  for 
fighting  is  what  most  inspired  the  original  author  of  the  legend  : 

Ecce  locum  pugnae  conspexerit,  et  numeratum 
Per  latos  aciem  campos  digessit  et  agros, 
lamque  infra  iactum  teli  congressus  uterque 
Constiterat  cuneus  ;  tunc  undique  clamor  ad  auras 
Tollitur,  horrendam  confundunt  classica  vocem, 
Continuoque  hastae  volitant  hinc  indeque  densae. 
Fraxinus  et  cornusludum  miscebant  in  unum, 
Fulminis  inque  modum  cuspis  vibrata  micabat, 
Ac,  veluti  Boreae  sub  tempore  nix  glomerata 
Spargitur,  haud  aliter  saevas  iecere  sagittas. 
Postremum  cunctis  utroque  ex  agmine  pilis 
Absumptis,  manus  ad  mucronem  vertitur  omnis, 
Fulmineos  promunt  enses,  clipeosque  revolvunt, 
Concumint  acies  demum,  pugnamque  restaurant ; 
Pectoribus  partim  rumpuntur  pectora  equorum, 
Stemitur  et  quaedam  pars  duro  umbone  virorum. 

Wherever  Waltharius  appears,  mowing  down  the  ranks  before  him  like  ripe  crops 
under  the  sickle,  the  enemy  cast  aside  their  shields  and,  giving  free  rein  to  their 
horses,  make  way  for  him.  At  last  the  battle  is  won,  and  the  young  victor  returns 
crowned  with  laurel  to  receive  the  congratulations  of  the  courtiers. 


26  MEDIAEVAL   AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

As  soon  as  the  first  inquiries  and  accounts  of  the  fight  are  over,  Waltharius 

seeks  repose  in  the  palace  and  finds  Hiltgunt  alone.     Over  a  beaker  of  wine  that 

she  brings  for  his  refreshment,  he  reminds  the  princess  of  their  early  betrothal,  and 

proposes  flight  and  marriage.     The  maiden  at  first  distrusts  the  sincerity  of  the 

proposal  : 

"  Quid  lingua  simulas  quod  ab  imo  pectore  damnas, 

Oreque  persuades  toto  quod  corde  refutas  ? 

Sit  veluti  talem  pudor  ingens  ducere  nuptam." 

Waltharius  protests  his  sincerity,  and  that  he  should  have  fled  to  his  fatherland 
long  before. 

Si  non  Hiltgundem  solam  remanere  dolerem. 

The  maiden  consents  and  the  flight  is  arranged.  Waltharius  invites  the  king  and 
the  nobles  to  a  sumptuous  banquet,  where  the  wine  flows  freely  until  the  guests, 
overcome  with  food  and  liberal  potations,  sink  into  slumber.  In  the  meantime  the 
fugitives,  with  a  Homeric  disregard  for  the  niceties  of  property  right,  supply  them- 
selves abundantly  from  the  treasure-house  of  the  king,  and  well  armed  and 
equipped  set  out  on  their  homeward  journey.  At  dawn  they  conceal  themselves 
in  a  forest,  where  they  spend  an  anxious  day  : 

In  tantum  timor  muliebria  pectora  pulsat, 
Horreat  ut  cunctos  aurae  ventique  susurros, 
Formidans  volucres,  collisos  sive  racemos  ; 
Hinc  odium  exilii,  patriae  amor  incubat  inde. 

The  scene  in  the  banquet  when  the  guests  awake  and  find  their  host  missing  is 

quite  realistic  : 

Attila  nempe  manu  caput  amplexatus  utraque 
Egreditur  thalamo  rex,  Walthariumque  dolendo 
Advocat  ut  proprium  quereretur  forte  dolorem. 

The  king's  anger  and  grief  at  the  flight  of  the  hostages  is  extreme,  and  his  vary- 
ing mood  finds  free  expression  in  his  words.  He  abstains  from  food  and  passes 
a  restless  night : 

Namque  ubi  nox  rebus  iam  dempserat  atra  colores, 
Decidit  in  lectum,  veruni  nee  luraina  clausit. 
Nunc  latus  in  dextrum  fultus,  nunc  inque  sinistrum, 
Et  veluti  iaculo  pectus  transfixus  acuto 
Palpi  tat,  atque  caput  hue  et  mox  iactitat  illuc, 
Et  modo  subrectus  fulcro  consederat  amens. 

At  the  council  on  the  following  day  none  of  the  nobles  volunteer,  even  under 
the  stimulus  of  a  large  reward,  to  pursue  and  recover  a  hostage  with  whose  prowess 
they  are  so  familiar.  Waltharius  and  Hiltgunt  continue  unmolested  for  their  four 
days'  journey  to  the  Rhine.  News  of  the  passage  of  the  fugitives  is  carried  at 
once  to  the  Frankish  king,  at  Worms,  and  he  suspects  their  identity.  Guntharius 
is  represented  as  a  true  robber  knight,  and  despite  the  dissuasion  of  Hageno,  to 
whom  both  friendship  and  prudence  make  an  attack  upon  his  old  companion  at  arms 
distasteful,  he  sets  out  with  twelve  followers  to  intercept  the  strangers  and  relieve 


LATIN    OF   THE    MIDDLE   AGES.  27 

them  of  their  treasure.  Waltharius  and  Hiltgunt  are  overtaken  when  encamped  in 
a  rocky  pass  of  the  Vosges,  where  the  former  gives  battle  to  his  pursuers  and  kills 
in  turn  eleven  of  the  companions  of  Guntharius.  A  description  of  the  successive 
combats,  and  the  dialogues  that  in  some  instances  precede  them  form  the  major 
part  of  the  remainder'of  the  poem.  The  interest  here  is  centered  in  the  sixth  con- 
test. Patavrid,  the  nephew  of  Hagano,  advances  to  win  the  king's  reward  and 
avenge  his  slain  companions.  The  unhappy  uncle,  who  refuses  to  take  active 
part  in  an  exploit,  the  melancholy  outcome  of  which  he  already  forebodes,  tries  in 
vain  to  restrain  the  impetuous  ardor  of  the  youth  : 

* '  Quonam  ruis  ?     Aspice  mortem, 
Qualiter  arridet !  desiste.     En  ultima  Parcae 
Fila  legunt.     O  care  nepos,  te  mens  tua  fallit. 
Desine.     Waltharii  tu  denique  viribus  impar." 

But  the  boy  rushes  undaunted  to  the  combat,  and  Hagano  imprecates  the  auri 
sacra  fames  that  has  brought  disaster  upon  his  sovereign  and  his  house  : 

**  O  vortex  mundi,  fames  insatiata  habendi ! 
Gurges  avaritiae,  cunctorum  fibra  malorum  ! 
O  utinam  solum  glutires,  dira,  metallum 
Divitiasque  alias,  homines  impune  remittens. 

En  caecus  mortem  properat  gustare  nefandum, 

Et  vili  pro  laude  cupit  descendere  ad  umbras. 

Heu  mihi,  care  nepos,  matri  quid,  perdite,  mandas  ? 

Quis  nuper  ductam  refovebit,  care,  maritam, 

Cui  nee,  rapte,  spei  pueri  ludicra  dedisti  ? 

Quis  tibi  nam  furor  est?    Unde  haec  dementia  venit?" 

Sic  ait  et  gremium  lacrimis  conspersit  obortis, 

Et^  **  Longum,  formose,  vale,"  singultibus  edit. 

Waltharius  surmises  the  occasion  of  his  friend's  grief  from  afar,  and  himself 
tries  to  dissuade  the  youth  from  the  combat.  The  young  man,  however,  only 
answers  his  opponent's  advice  with  taunts  : 

Dixit,  et  in  verbo  nodosam  destinat  hastem, 
Cuspide  quam  propria  divertens  transtulit  heros, 
Quae  subvecta  coris  ac  viribus  acta  furentis 
In  castrum  venit  atque  pedes  stetit  ante  puellae. 
Ipsa  metu  perculsa  sonum  prompsit  muliebrem  ; 
At,  postquam  tenuis  redit  in  praecordia  virtus, 
Paulum  respiciens  spectat  num  viveret  heros. 

Again  Waltharius  bids  his  young  adversary  retire  from  the  unequal  contest, 
but  his  words  have  no  other  effect  than  to  render  him  the  more  determined  to  con- 
tinue the  combat : 


28  MEDIAEVAL    AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

At  ille  furens  gladium  nudavit  et  ipsum 
Incurrens  petiit,  vulnusque  a  vertice  librat. 
Alpharides  parmam  demum  concusserat  aptam, 
Et  spumantis  apri  frendens  de  more  tacebat. 
Ille  ferire  volens  se  pronior  omnem  ad  ictum 
Exposuit ;  sed  Waltharius  sub  tegmine  flexus 
Delituit,  corpusque  suum  contraxit,  et  ecce 
Vulnere  delusus  iuvenis  recidebat  ineptus. 
Finis  erat ;  nisi  quod  genibus  tellure  refixis 
Beiliger  accubuit,  calibemque  sub  orbe  cavebat. 
Hie  dum  consurgit,  pariter  se  subrigit  ille, 
Ac  citius  scutum  trepidus  sibi  praetulit,  atque 
Frustra  certamen  renovare  parabat.     At  illiun 
Alpharides  fixa  gladio  petit  ocius  hasta, 
At  medium  clipei  dempsit  vasto  impete  partem, 
Hamatam  resecans  loricam  atque  ilia  nudans, 
Labitur  infelix  Patavrid  sua  viscera  ceroens, 
Silvestrique  ferae  corpus,  animam  dedit  Oreo. 

Many  of  the  details  of  the  fight  betray  the  barbarous  character  of  the  age  de- 
picted. The  slain  are  beheaded  or  fixed  to  the  ground  with  a  lance.  At  night  the 
king  and  Hagano  retire,  prepared  to  renew  the  contest  on  the  following  day,  from 
an  ambuscade.  Waltharius  fortifies  his  position  as  best  he  can,  in  order  to  be 
prepared  for  a  night  surprise,  and  shares  the  watch  with  his  maiden  companion. 
But  first  he  gives  attention  to  the  dead  ;  and  for  the  moment  a  Christian  element, 
and  perhaps  a  suggestion  of  chivalry  already  hinted  at  in  the  attitude  of  Wal- 
tharius towards  Patavrid,  enters  into  the  poem  : 

Ad  truncos  sese  convertit,  amaro 
Cum  gemitu,  et  cuicumque  suum  caput  applicat,  atque 
Contra  orientalem  prostratus  corpore  partem, 
Ac  nudum  retinens  ensem  hac  cum  voce  precatur  : 
**  Rerum  factori,  sed  in  omnia  facta  regenti, 
Nil  sine  permissu  cuius  vel  denique  iussu 
Constat,  ago  gratias,  qui  me  defendit  iniquis 
Hostilis  turmae  telis,  nee  non  quoque  probris. 
Deprecor  at  Dominum  contrita  mente  benignum, 
Ut  qui  peccantes  non  vult,  sed  perdere  culpas, 
Hos  in  caelesti  praestet  mihi  sede  videri." 

In  the  morning,  as  they  are  threading  the  forest  path,  Hiltgunt  perceives  and 
warns  her  lover  of  an  impending  attack  from  the  king  and  Hagano,  whose  fidelity 
to  his  lord  will  not  permit  him  to  see  the  latter  return  disgraced  from  the  expedi- 
tion. In  the  fight  that  ensues,  all  three  of  the  combatants  are  wounded  ;  the  king 
parts  with  one  leg,  Hagano  with  an  eye,  and  Waltharius  with  his  right  hand. 
Finally  the  sadly  mutilated  warriors  agree  upon  terms  of  peace,  Hiltgunt  brings 
wine,  and  the  former  enemies  indulge  in  a  grim  contest  of  wit — *'  hyperborean 
humor,"  Carlyle  would  call  it — over  their  cups  that  might  elicit  the  "Homeric 


LATIN    OF    THE    MIDDLE    AGES.  29 

laughter"  which  Thoreau  used  to  imagine  as  resounding  from  the  bare  rafters  of 
the  primeval  palace  : 

Francus  ait :   '*  lam  dehinc  cervos  agitabis,  amice, 

Quorum  de  corio  wantis  sine  fine  fruaris  ; 

At  dextrum  moneo  tenera  lanugine  comple, 

Ut  causae  ignaros  palmae  sub  imagine  fallas. 

Wah  !    Sed  quid  dicis  quod  ritum  infringere  gentis, 

Ac  dextro  femori  gladium  agglomerare  videris, 

Uxorique  tuae,  si  quando  ea  cura  subintrat, 

Perverso  amplexu  circumdabis  euge  sinistram  ? 

lam  quid  demoror  ?     En  posthac  tibi  quicquid  agendum  est, 

Laeva  manus  faciet."     Cui,  Walthare,  taHa  reddis  : 

**  Cur  tam  prosilias  admiror,  lusce  Sicamber. 

Si  venor  cervos,  carnem  vitabis  aprinam  ; 

Ex  hoc  iam  famulis  tu  suspectando  iubebis, 

Heroum  turba  transversa  tuendo  salutans." 

So  we  bid  farewell  to  the  battered  warriors  feasting  under  the  greenwood  tree, 
Waltharius  and  Hiltgunt  reach  their  fatherland,  are  married,  and  for  thrice  ten 
years  rule  their  people,  happy  in  peace  and  successful  in  war. 

Haec  est  Waltharii  poesis.     Nos  salvet  I  H  C. 

says  the  poet  in  closing. 

Of  course  Waltharius  is  one  of  the  most  Teutonic  of  mediaeval  poems  because 
it  is  practically  a  version  of  a  German  legend.  From  the  mere  point  of  Latinity — 
one  that  hardly  does  the  poem  justice — the  literary  interest  is  subservient  to  the 
linguistic  ;  for  we  do  not,  as  in  the  Conflictus  Veris  et  Hietnis,  see  Germanic  influ- 
ence dominating  a  piece  that  is  intended  to  be  classical.  We  expect  the  spirit  of 
jhe  Waltharius  to  be  German  in  any  case.  What  does  interest  us  is  to  see  the 
mobility  with  which  the  classical  language  adapts  itself  to  the  demands  of  a  story, 
half  saga,  half  romance,  which  is  anything  but  classical  in  its  conception  and 
execution. 

There  are,  naturally,  classical  influences  apparent  in  the  poem,  but  they  seem 
to  be  confined  to  reminiscences  from  the  Aeneid.^  But  the  poet  is  by  no  means  a 
slave  to  Vergilian  expression.  He  had  an  excellent  opportunity  in  the  eleventh 
line  of  the  poem  to  work  in  Parcere  subjectis  et  debellare  superbos ;  a  mere  cen- 
tonizer  would  have  done  so  ;  but  there  is  hardly  a  suggestion  of  the  line  in  Foedeta 
supplicibiis  donans  sterttensque  rebelles,  so  far  as  language  is  concerned.  There 
are  occasionally  real  centos.     In  our  quotations  we  have 

lamque  infra  iactum  teli  congressus  uterque 
Constiterat, 
and  we  find  in  the  Aeneid,  xi,  608  : 

*  Silvestrique  ferae  corpus,  anhnam  dedit  Oreo  is  of  course  Homeric  (II,  A),  probably 
derived  indirectly  through  a  late  Latin  version. 


3©  ^       MEDIAEVAL   AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

lamque  infra  iactum  teli  progressus  uterque 
Constiterat; 

En  viltima  Parcae 
Fila  legimt, 

and  again  in  the  Aeneid,  X.,  814  : 

Extremaque  Lauso 
Parcae  fila  legunt. 

Similarly  lacrimis  conspersit  oboi-tis  suggests  the  lacrimis  adfabar  obortis  of 
Aeneid,  iii.,  392  ;  lojzgum,  formose,  vale,  is  familiar  from  the  third  eclogue,  79  ;  and 
spumans  as  an  epithet  of  the  wild  boar  at  bay  in  the  third  book  of  the  Aeneid,  line 
158.  There  is  also  a  certain  parallel,  of  thought  rather  than  of  language,  between 
Hagano's  appeal  to  Patavrid  and  Hecuba's  address  to  Priam  when  she  sees  him 
preparing  for  battle,  in  the  second  book  of  the  Aeneid.  But  it  is  in  just  such 
places  as  this,  and  the  one  first  mentioned,  that  we  see  the  independence  of  the 
poet  in  choosing  his  form  of  expression.  In  the  125  lines  quoted  there  are  four  real 
centos,  though  the  episodes  described  give  every  excuse  for  their  employment. 
They  are  used  just  enough  to  make  the  originality  of  the  writer  evident. 

Occasionally  a  Germanism  breaks  through  into  the  Latin  with  rather  picturesque 
effect.  Mortem  gusiare,  to  taste  death,  and  voluptatem  gustare,  to  taste  pleasure, 
are  of  this  sort.  Cras  erupit,  * '  the  morrow  broke, ' '  also  occurs  in  a  line  not  quoted 
above.  The  Teutonic  verse  structure  appears  frequently,  though  not  to  the  same 
extent  that  it  does  in  the  Conjlictus  Veris  et  Hiemis.  There  are  some  leonines, 
with  more  or  less  perfect  rhymes,  especially  the  rhyme  in  the  third  and  fifth  foot  so 
common  in  the  earlier  poem  ;  cunctorum  Jibra  malorutn ;  collisos  sive  racemos  ; 
nodosam  destinat  hastam.  A  few  rh}Tning  couplets  occur,  equorutn — viroruniy 
damttas — refutas,  umbras — niandas.  Alliteration  is  employed  frequently:  Pectori- 
btis  partim  rumfnintur  pectora  equorum  ;  In  tantumgue  timor  uiuliebria  pectora 
puhat.  But  these  devices  are  not  overworked.  They  do  not  render 4he  verse 
artificial,  as  they  do  in  the  lives  of  the  Saints.  Elision  is  common.  It  i!J  occasion, 
ally  disregarded,  omnem  ad  ictum — also  read  omnis  ad  ictum — ;  and  vasto  impete- 
partem  is  with  difficulty  construed  to  suit  both  the  sense  and  the  metre  at  the  same 
time.  Senior  means  seigneur^  and  wantis  is  an  old  form  of  the  modem  French 
gants. 

A  poem  that  forms  a  fitting  contrast  to  the  Waltherius,  and  one  that  illustrates 
an  opposite  tendency  in  mediaeval  verse,  is  the  Troilus  oi  Albertus  Standensis. 
This  is  a  work  of  the  early  thirteeth  century,  written  in  elegiac  verse  and  dealing, 
as  the  name  indicates,  with  the  Trojan  cycle.  The  theme  is  classical,  of  course, 
and  rather  trite ;  so  that  the  author  could  hardly  hope  to  do  anything  original  with 
his  subject.  We  feel  throughout  that  he  wrote  with  the  ear  alone,  while  Ekkehart 
wrote  with  the  heart  and  the  eye  as  well.  Yet  in  smoothness  of  verse  and  ele- 
gance of  diction  the  Troilus  far  surpasses  the  earlier  work.  This  is  largely  due, 
however,  to  the  fact  that  the  author  or  compiler  has  woven  into  his  poem  innumer- 
able centos  from  Vergil,  Horace,  Ovid,  and  the  later  poets.  Indeed  the  work  is 
chiefly  interesting  for  the  evidence  it  gives  of  thorough  and  extensive  familiarity 
with  classical  poetry  on  the  part  of  a  mediaeval  monk. 

The  so-called  catenae y  works  consisting  in  great  part  of  centos  and  para- 
phrases from  the  works  of  previous  authors,  became  common  in  both  Latin  and 


LATIN    OF    THE    MIDDLE     AGES.  ,  3 1 

Greek  as  soon  as  the  impulse  of  original  authorship  had  spent  itself.  Even  in 
pagan  literature  we  have  compilers  like  Gellius  and  epitomizers  like  Eutropius  in- 
geniously employing  the  debris  of  former  literary  monuments  in  constructing  and 
ornamenting  their  own  less  pretentious  works.  But  this  acknowledged  and,  to  a 
certain  extent,  critical  use  of  material  conveniently  at  hand,  merely  suggests  the 
beginning  of  a  tendency  that  ended  in  the  ninth  and  tenth  centuries  in  almost 
complete  literary  parasitism  so  far  as  a  large  portion  of  Latin  writing  was  con- 
cerned. To  be  sure  this  does  not  include  all  that  was  written  by  any  means, 
and  many  of  the  catenae  were  doubtless  intended  merely  for  convenient  collections 
of  experts.  A  few  centuries  later,  in  the  hands  of  a  man  like  Aquinas,  such  a 
compilation  became  really  a  contribution  to  literature.  But  in  an  earlier  and  less 
cultivated  age  these  literary  fungi  often  spread  over  and  tried  to  conceal  the  pros- 
trate trunks  from  which  they  derived  their  support  and  nourishment.  They  have 
thus  sometimes  done  an  involuntary  service  by  preserving  what  they  intended  to 
destroy.  Muratori,  in  his  forty-third  dissertation,  gives  several  examples  of  this 
sort  of  literature  in  prose. 

Though  the  Troilus  does  not  belong  to  this  last  class  of  purely  parasitical  lit- 
erature, in  that  the  detail  of  plot  and  structure  in  the  poem  is  to  some  extent 
original,  so  far  as  language  is  concerned  it  is  practically  a  catena  in  verse.  It 
shows  what  a  man  of  wide  reading  and  retentive  memory  could  produce  without 
drawing  to  any  very  great  extent  upon  his  stock  of  original  expressions.  The  lines 
quoted  are  taken  at  random,  and  they  are  almost  immediately  preceded  and  fol- 
lowed by  centos.  The  subject  is  the  address  of  Agamemnon  to  the  Greeks  after 
the  retreat  to  the  ships  : 

Book  III,  w.  99-112  : 

Nulla  dies  adeo  est  pluvialibus  obsita  nimbis 

Non  intermissis  quod  fluat  imber  aquis. 
Non  Aurora  diem  sed  laudat  vespera,  frustra 

Principium  celebras,  omnia  fine  legas. 
Causa  iubet  melior  superos  superare  secundos  ; 

Non  habet  eventus  sordida  praeda  bonos. 
Troia  modum  teneas  nodum  tibi  desinit  hostis, 

Crastina  sit  nescis  quid  paritura  dies. 
Omnia  sunt  hominum  tenui  pendentia  filo, 

Multa  levata  diu  cemo  ruisse  cito. 
Tu  quoque  fac  timeas  ;    et  quae  modo  tuta  videntur, 

Dum  loqueris,  fieri  tristia  posse  puta. 
Victorem  victo  succumbere  saepe  videmus, 

Saepe  creat  molles  aspera  spina  rosas. 

Besides  an  allusion  to  Horace  or  Lucan,  the  above  lines  contain  the  following 
centos  from  Ovid  : 

Nulla  dies  adeo  est  australibus  humida  nimbis 
Non  intermissis  ut  fluat  imber  aquis. 
Pont.  IV,  1-2. 


32  MEDIAEVAL   AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

Non  habet  eventus  sordida  praeda  bonos. 

Amores,  I,  lo,  48. 

Omnia  sunt  hominum  tenui  pendentia  filo, 
Et  subito  casu  quae  valuere  ruunt. 

Pont.  Ill,  35-36. 

Tu  quoque  fac  timeas ;    et  quae  tibi  laeta  videntur, 
Duni  loqueris,  fieri  tristia  posse  puta. 
Pont.  Ill,  57-58. 

If  we  were  to  omit  the  last  two  lines,  Ovid  would  furnish  verbally  or  suggest 
more  than  half  the  quotation.  This  average  would  hardly  hold  good  of  the  whole 
poem,  and  the  sources  drawn  upon  here  are  more  limited  than  they  are  in  other 
parts  of  the  work.  But  the  verses  given  are  sufficient  to  show  how  the  writer 
built  up  his  mosaic ;  and  after  all,  the  ability  to  employ  centos  so  felicitously  is 
something  nearly  akin  to  artistic  inspiration.  The  original  verses,  too,  are  some- 
times not  without  their  merit.  The  man  who  wrote  such  a  work  must  have  pos- 
sessed not  only  a  wide  familiarity  with  classical  writers,  but  also  some  appreciation 
of  good  poetry  and,  within  mediaeval  limitations,  a  cultivated  taste.  It  is  not 
difficult  to  imagine  in  Albertus  a  sort  of  monkish  Gray. 

The  proemium  to  the  Troilus  contains  a  curious  example  of  the  petty  cleverness 
which  was  rather  a  characteristic  of  the  verse  of  this  time,  and  is  perhaps  worth 
quoting  for  that  reason.  The  writer  says  in  reply  to  those  who  criticise  his 
writing  a  heroic  poem  in  elegiacs : 

Sane  concede,  sed  gesta  miserrima  scribo, 

Et  strages  miseras  miserorum,  qui  misereri 

Noluerant  sibi  nee  aliis  sed  morte  metebant 

Se  misera  misere,  misero  stimulante  furore. 

Per  miseros  igitur  elegos  hoc  ducere  carmen. 

Decrevi  miserum,  sortem  miseratus  eorum 

De  quibus  hie  legitur,  miseri  qui  castra  sequuntur. 

While  the  Troilus  and  Waltharius  are  representative  poems  of  the  Middle  Ages, 
and  could  have  been  written  only  at  that  time,  they  are  not  typical  of  mediaeval 
thought  and  feeling  in  every  respect.  Perhaps  they  approach  too  near  to  present- 
day  standards  of  excellence  for  that.  The  rhymed  lives  of  the  Saints  and  the  met- 
rical chronicles  were  doubtless  more  in  accordance  with  the  taste  and  spirit  of  the 
times  when  they  were  written.  We  have  in  these  two  poems  two  opposite  liter- 
ary tendencies  represented.  In  the  earlier  poem  original  inspiration  is  trying  to 
break  the  mortmain  of  a  dead  language — a  language  dead  or  moribund  in  this 
sphere  at  least — and  stretches  its  laws  to  their  utmost  limits ;  in  the  later  the 
thought  is  facilely  subservient  to  the  phrase,  and  we  have  a  sort  of  plaster  cast,  a 
replica  of  a  classical  production  ;  one  clasps  hands  with  Beowulf  and  the  Niebel- 
ungenlied,  the  other  with  the  poetry  of  the  Renaissance.  The  former  is  more 
akin  in  both  time  and  spirit  to  the  Carolingian  revival,  where  we  have  the  begin- 
ning of  a  vigorous,  even  though  exotic,  Latin-Teutonic  literature,  that  might  have 
attained  some  degree  of  vitality  and  importance  in  secular  hands,  but  unfortunately 
took  to  celibacy  and  monastic  life  and  lost  itself  in  the  sterility  of  the  cloister. 


v^      \  D  n  /^  n  yp  ^^^ 
X  or  TM«  ^ 

(  J  :>fIVERSlTT 

LATIN    OF   THE   MIDDLE    AGES.  33 

The  later  poem  reflects  the  spirit  of  the  earlier,  half  romantic,  half  scholastic 
Renaissance,  that  preceded  the  Revival  of  Letters  in  Italy.  These  two  poems, 
therefore,  are  representative  not  only  of  two  opposite  linguistic  tendencies  as  man- 
ifested in  mediaeval  Latin  literature,  but  also  of  two  literary  periods. 

VL 

History  is  a  form  of  literature  always  cultivated  more  or  less,  even  among  the 
most  barbarous  nations.  In  a  rude  age  its  expression  is  apt  to  be  either  poetical 
and  the  distinction  between  fact  and  fiction  loosely  drawn,  or  else  it  becomes  a 
mere  record  of  barren  facts,  standing  in  about  the  same  relation  to  true  history  that 
an  epitaph  does  to  a  biography.  The  earliest  Germans  seem  to  have  favored  the 
metrical  form.*  The  sagas  of  the  Northern,  the  ballads  of  the  Celts,  probably  the 
"  great  number  of  verses  "  that  the  Druids  taught  to  their  acolytes,f  were  based 
upon  historical  traditions.  Annals  first  come  into  existence  with  the  introduction 
of  letters.  Their  very  baldness  and  brevity  suggest  the  laborious,  lapidary  char- 
acter of  early  writing. 

In  the  Middle  Ages  the  romances  represented  one  phase  of  this  literature,  the 
monastic  annals  the  other.  The  latter  in  some  cases,  especially  where  they  deal 
with  the  local  history  of  a  convent  or  city,  are  about  as  crude  from  a  linguistic  and 
literary  point  of  view  as  any  writings  that  have  been  handed  down  from  this 
period.  On  the  other  hand,  there  are  works  well  enough  written  and  extensive 
enough  to  deserve  a  place  in  true  historical  literature,  had  there  been  some  mani- 
festation of  the  critical  faculty  and  appreciation  of  historical  perspective  on  the 
part  of  their  authors.  As  it  is  they  are  origines,  sources  of  information  about  his- 
tory, rather  than  monuments  of  historical  literature  itself.  In  fact  the  mediaeval 
chronicles  represent  all  the  varying  styles  from  the  dryest  of  annals,  mere  records 
of  reigns,  wars,  peaces,  and  pestilences,  through  real  histories,  like  the  History 
of  the  Lombards  by  Paulus  Diaconus  or  Einhard's  Life  of  Charles^  memoirs  or 
anecdotal  histories  like  the  St.  Gall  account  of  the  exploits  of  Charlemagne  ex 
relationibiis  Adaelberti  militis,  qui  Hunico,  Saxicoque  et  Slavico  Caroli  hello  in- 
terfuit,  to  historical  romances  or  pure  prose  romances,  like  the  history  of  Geoffrey 
of  Monmouth,  or  the  story  of  Walter  in  the  Chronicon  Novaliciensis. 

Some  of  the  very  best  prose  of  the  Middle  Ages  is  found  in  isolated  passages 
of  the  more  important  chroniclers  and  historians.  Einhard,  the  prose  master  of 
the  Carolingian  revival,  wrote  his  life  of  Charles  upon  the  model  of  Suetonius' s  life 
of  Augustus;  and  though  this  imitative  attitude  may  have  led  him  to  sacrifice  origi- 
nality to  some  extent,  he  attained  a  style  that  would  not  have  done  discredit  in 
many  respects  to  his  Renaissance  successors.  An  interesting  comparison  of  the 
historical  style  of  the  early  mediaeval  and  late  mediaeval  periods  is  afforded  by  the 
description  of  Britain  from  Bede  and  from  Geoffrey  of  Monmouth.  The  value  of 
the  latter  as  an  example  of  Latinity  is  considerably  impaired  by  the  fact  that  it  is 
almost  entirely  a  paraphrase  of  a  similar  chapter  in  Gildas's  De  Excidio  Britanniae. 
But  then,  the  plagiarism  is  in  a  certain  sense  a  characteristic  thing.     Bede's  Ec- 

*  Carminibus  antiquis,  quod  unum  apudillos  memoriae  et  annalium  genus  est.    Tac. 
Germania,  2. 

Magnum  ibi  numerum  versuum  ediscere  dicuntur.     Caes.  B.  G.,  VI,  14. 


34  MEDI/EVAL    AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

desiastical  History  of  the  English  was  written  in  the  first  quarter  of  the  eighth,  and 
Geo^xey^  s  History  of  the  Britons  in  the  first  half  of  the  twelfth  century.  The  first, 
then,  dates  from  before  the  Carolingian  revival,  the  latter  from  the  century  preced- 
ing that  which  saw  the  birth  of  Dante. 

Baeda,  Historia  Ecclesiastica  Gentis  Anglorum,  I,  i:  Britannia,  Oceani  in- 
sula, cui  quondam  Albion  nomen  fuit,  inter  septentrionem  et  occasum  locata  est- 
Germaniae,  Galliae,  Hispaniae,  maximis  Europae  partibus  multo  intervallo  ad- 
versa.  Quae  per  milia  passuum  DCCC  in  Boream  longa,  latitudinis  habet  CC,  ex- 
ceptis  dumtaxat  prolixioribus  diversorum  promuntoriorum  tractibus,*  quibus  effic- 
iter  ut  circuitus  eius  quadrigies  octies  septuaginta  quinque  milia  compleat 

Opima  frigibus  atque  orboribus  insula,  et  alendis  optime  pecoribus  ac  iumentis  ;'|' 
vineas  etiam  quibusdam  inclocis  germinans ;  \  sed  et  avium  ferax  terra  marique 
generis  diversa.  Fluviis  quoque  multum  piscosis  ac  fontibus  praeclara  copiosis,  et 
quidem  praecipue  issico  abundat  et  arguilla. — Margaritas  omnis  quidem  coloris 
inveniunt,  id  est  et  rubicundi  et  purpurei  et  iacinthini  et  prasini,  sed  maxime  can- 
didi.§ — Quae  etiam  venis  metallorum,  aeris,  ferri,  et  plumbi  et  argenti  fecunda 
gignit  et  lapidem  gagatem  plurimum  optimumque — est  autem  nigrogemma  et  ardens 
igni  admotus  — Et  quia  prope  sub  ipso  septentrionali  vertice  mundi  iacet,  lucidas 
noctes  habet ;  ita  ut  medio  saepe  tempore  noctis  in  quaestionem  venit  intuentibus, 
utrum  crepusculum  adhuc  permaneat  vespertinum,  an  iam  advenerit  matutinum.  || 

Galfredus,  Historia  Britonum,  I,  2 :  Britannia,  insula  optima,  in  occi- 
dentali  Oceano  inter  Galliam  est  et  Hiberniam  sita ;  octingenta  milia  in  longum, 
ducenta  verum  in  latum  continens,  quicquid  mortalium  usui  congruit  indeficienti 
fertilitate  ministrat.  Omni  enim  genere  metalli  fecunda,  campos  late  pansos 
habet  collesque  praepollenti  culturae  aptos,  in  quibus  fruguum  diversitates 
ubertate  glebae  temporibus  suis  proveniunt.  Habet  nemora  universis  ferarum 
generibus  repleta,  quorum  in  saltibus  et  in  alternandis  animalium  pastibus  gramina 
conveniunt,  et  advolantibus  apibus  flores  diversorum  colorum  mella  distribuunt. 
Habet  prata  sub  aeriis  montibus  amoeno  situ  virentia,  in  quibus  fontes  lucidissimi 
per  nitidos  rivos  leni  murmure  manentes  suaves  sopores  in  ripis  accubantibus  irri- 
gant.  Porro  lacubus  atque  piscosis  fluviis  irrigua  est,  et,  praeter  meridianae 
plagae  fretum  quo  ad  Gallias  navigatur,  tria  nobilia  flumina,  Tamesis  videlicet  et 
Sabrinae,  necnon  et  Humbrae,  velut  tria  bracchia  extendit ;  quibus  transmarina 
commercia  ex  universis  nationibus  eiusdem  navigio  feruntur. 

The  opening  words  and  the  expressions  metalli  fecunda  and  piscosis  fluviis 
suggest  Bede's  account,  vi\i\\&  fruguum  diversitates  ubertate  glebae  temporibus  suis 
proveniunt  may  have  a  very  remote  connection  with  Tacitus'  solum  patiens  fru- 
guum— tarde  mitescunt,  cito  proveniunt.  The  portion  of  the  third  section  of 
Gildas'  s  De  Excidio  Britanniae,  from  which  Geoffrey  gets  the  suggestion  for  his 
account,  reads  as  follows  : 

*  Excejitis  diversorum  prolixioribus  promontoriorutn  tractibus.   Gildas,  op.  cit.,  sec.  3, 

■\  Pecorunt  rnagnus  numerus.    Caes.B.  G.,  V.,  12. 

J  Since  Roman  times, — Solum, praeter  oleam.  vitemque— patiens /rugutn.    Tac.  Agricola, 


12. 


§  Gignit  et  Oceanus  margarita  sed  subfusca  ac  liventia,  id.,  12. 

II  Nox  clara  et  in  extrema  Britanniae  parte  brevis,  utfinem  atque  initium  lucis  exiguo 
discritnine  internoscas ,  id.,  12. 


LATIN    OF    THE    MIDDLE    AGES. 


35 


"Campis  quoque  fulget  late  pansis  collibusque  amoeno  situ  locatis,  praepol- 
lenti  culturae  aptis,  montibusque  alternandis  animalium  pastibus  optime  convenien- 
tibus,  quorum  diversorum  colorum  flores  humanis  gressibus  pulsati  non  indecentem 
quondam  ceu  picturam  eisdem  imprimebant — electa  veluti  sponsa  monilibus  diver- 
sis  ornata,  foutibus  lucidis,  crebris  undis  niveas  veluti  glareas  palantibus,  pernitidis 
rivis  leni  murmure  serpentibus,  quorumque  in  ripis  accubantibus  suavis  soporis 
pignus  praetendentibus,  et  lacubus  frigidum -aquae  torrentum  vivae  exundantibus, 
irrigua. — Absque  meridianae  freto  plagae,  quo  ad  Galliam  Belgicam  navigatur, 
vallata  duorum  ostiis  nobilium  Thamesis  ac  Sabrinae  fiuminum  veluti  brachiis,  per 
quae  eidem  olim  transmarinae  deliciae  vehebantur  ratibus. 

Though  the  quotations  from  Geoffrey  and  Gildas  are  very  similar,  there  are 
traces  of  the  schoolman  in  the  later  work.  Such  conceptions  as  indejicienti  fertil- 
itate  ^  fruguum  diversitates ,  transmarina  commercia  would  have  been  expressed 
more  concretely  even  at  the  time  of  Gildas.  With  the  rise  of  scholasticism,  histo- 
rical writing  assumed  new  nuances  of  style  from  the  reaction  of  dialectic  literature 
upon  it.  We  feel  at  once  the  difference  between  the  Latin  of  Einhard  and  his 
contemporaries,  and  that  of  Suger,  the  twelfth-century  biographer  of  Louis  the 
Fat.  There  is  a  tendency  in  the  latter  to  favor  abstracts  and  to  introduce  gen- 
eral for  special  conceptions,  that  we  do  not  find  in  the  earlier  writers.  Though 
the  Latin  was  from  one  point  of  view  more  polished,  in  its  very  essence  it  had  de- 
parted farther  from  classical  ideals  with  the  course  of  time.  This  is  especially  true 
of  the  Norman  and  French  school  of  prose  writers.  In  Italy  it  is  chiefly  legal 
Latin  that  influences  the  chroniclers  of  the  three  centuries  preceding  the  Renais- 
sance.* There  is  a  popular  vein  occasionally  visible  in  the  historical  writings 
of  the  North  that  relieves  somewhat  the  abstractness  and  aridity  of  the  Latin. 

The  imitation  of  antiquity  was  more  unreservedly  recognized  as  a  means  of 
forming  style,  however,  in  this  branch  of  literature  than  in  any  other  department 
of  prose.  This  was  natural.  There  were  fewer  ideas  to  be  expressed  in  a  narra- 
tion involving  principally  secular  history  than  in  any  other  form  of  literature  that 
could  not  be  found  in  the  Roman  writers.  To  be  sure  military  tactics  and  the 
methods  of  organizing  men  for  warfare  had  changed.  The  theories  of  attack  and 
defense,  especially  in  the  case  of  feudal  strongholds,  were  totally  different  from  those 
of  the  Romans.  Political  organization  was  also  entirely  different,  and  a  host  of  new 
institutions  and  a  wholly  new  officialdom  had  appeared  ;  but  the  effect  was  not,  like 
that  introduced  by  a  change  of  religion  and  philosophical  conceptions,  one  that 
went  down  to  the  very  vitals  of  the  language  which  formed  their  medium  of  ex- 
pression. The  mediaeval  political  and  social  organization  was  as  concrete  as  the 
classical,  and  it  is  only  when  we  get  into  the  realm  of  Church  dogma  as  affecting 
secular  affairs,  and  when  ecclesiastical  matters,  miracles  and  anecdotes  of  saints 
and  martyrs,  become  inextricably  mingled  with  the  narrative  of  profane  events,  as 
occasionally  happens  in  Gregory  of  Tours,  that  we  have  anything  like  the  same 
feeling  of  strangeness  in  looking  over  a  mediaeval  chronicle  that  we  have  when 
we  first  glance  into  a  theological  work  or  a  scholastic  treatise. 

A  language  is  usually  modified  when  it  is  called  upon  to  express  a  new  class 
of  conceptions.     We  have  seen  that  this  was  true  of  I>atin  at  the  time  of  the  intro- 

*  Centos  from  the  Institutes  and  Digest  are  common  in  Italian  works  after  the  tenth  century, 
cf.  the  Rhetorimachia  of  Anselm  the  Peripatetic,  Thiemmier,  o.  c. 


36  MEDI/EVAL    AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

duction  of  Christianity  into  the  Western  Empire.  Another  linguistic  creative 
period  was  occasioned  by  the  rise  of  the  universities  and  the  elaboration  of  the 
scholastic  philosophy  after  the  Crusades.  From  the  time  of  Benedict,  Latin  had 
been  most  at  home  in  the  monasteries  ;  we  now  come  to  a  time  when  the  uni- 
versities shared  with  these  the  function  of  protecting  and  cherishing  the  lan- 
guage of  letters.  But  there  was  more  positive,  creative  energy  in  the  universities 
than  in  the  cloisters.  The  latter  had  acted  passively,  had  been  the  mother  of  let- 
ters, while  the  former  disciplined  them  with  paternal  severity  and  trained  them  to 
usefulness  in  a  new  sphere  of  action.  Scholastic  Latin  has  contributed  so  much 
to  both  modern  popular  and  technical  language  that,  though  many  of  its  terms  and 
constructions  are  without  taste,  are  unnatural  and  artificial,  though  it  is  in  some 
respects  a  sort  of  Frankenstein's  monster  of  a  language,  its  positive  influence  upon 
Latin  was  probably  greater  than  its  negative;  it  added  more  than  it  detracted  ;  it 
increased  the  total  potentiality  of  expression  in  that  tongue  ;  so  that  its  contributions 
were  available  up  to  the  time  of  Bacon  and  Spinoza.  At  the  same  time,  by 
dividing  the  literary  language  into  a  popular  and  a  learned  dialect,  the  universities 
broke  up  the  unity  which  had  hitherto  prevailed  in  Latin  letters.  The  Gesta 
Romanoruni  and  the  songs  of  the  Goliardi  represent  one  phase  ;  the  later  theo- 
logical works  and  such  treatises  as  the  De  3Iona?-chia  of  Dante  represent  the  op- 
posite phase  of  the  literature  that  followed. 

Scholasticism,  however,  in  the  broad  sense  of  the  word,  began  much  earlier 
than  the  mediaeval  schools.  There  is  no  absolute  break  between  the  Roman 
patristic  and  the  scholastic  literature.  The  later  Church  Fathers— if  we  confine 
the  term  to  writers  who  flourished  before  the  fall  of  Rome — were  followed  by  the 
writers  of  compendia  of  universal  knowledge,  Cassiodorus,  Isidorus  and  Bede. 
The  human  intellect  was  entering  upon  a  chrysalis  stage  before  the  approaching  frosts 
of  the  barbarian  winter  that  was  already  at  hand  or  threatening  from  the  North. 
During  the  Middle  Ages  there  was  very  little  reception  or  assimilation  from  with- 
out. Knowledge  kept  feeding  upon  itself,  digesting  and  redigesting,  working 
over  and  casting  into  new  forms  the  material  that  antiquity  had  collected.  We 
express  this  activity  by  the  term  Scholasticism. 

Still,  it  was  impossible  completely  to  exclude  the  influence  of  the  Greek  and 
Graeco-Semitic  culture  of  the  Byzantines  and  Saracens.  There  was  a  feeling 
hostile  to  Greek  as  being  associated  with  schism,  and  to  Arabic  as  being  as- 
sociated with  Islamism  ;  but  at  the  point  where  the  two  areas  of  culture  came 
into  contact,  as  in  Sicily  and  Spain,  there  was  an  inevitable  stimulation  of  thought 
and  intellectual  activity  from  the  antagonism  and  friction  which  the  hostile  systems 
developed,  as  well  as  from  the  contributions  which  each  school  of  thought  made 
to  the  other. 

The  influence  of  the  Arabian  learning  was  important  more  because  it  directed 
scholastic  thought  into  new  channels  and  to  new  sources  of  information,  than  on 
account  of  any  original  contributions  to  European  knowledge.  Even  though  more 
brilliant,  the  Saracenic  culture  did  not  have  the  same  deep  sources  and  organic 
connection  with  the  whole  social  system  that  scholastic  culture  possessed.  It  did 
not  take  deep  enough  root  to  be  perennial.  There  seems  to  have  been  a  renais- 
sance with  every  liberal  minded  ruler.  In  the  time  of  the  Calif  Haken  II.,  we 
are  told,  Andalusia  became  the  great  literary  market  of  the  world,  to  which  the 


LATIN    OF   THE   MIDDLE    AGES.  37 

products  of  every  dime  were  carried.  Books  written  in  Syria  and  Persia  were 
known  there  sooner  than  in  the  Orient.  Haken  had  at  Cairo,  Bagdad,  Damascus 
and  Alexandria  agents  commissioned  to  procure  for  him  at  any  price  ancient  or 
modern  works  of  science.  The  catalogue  of  his  library  in  itself  comprised  forty-four 
volumes,  though  it  contained  only  the  title  of  each  book.  His  successor,  how- 
ever, chancing  to  be  a  religious  fanatic,  burned  or  threw  into  the  palace  cisterns 
all  but  the  orthodox  theological  works.  A  similar  though  more  interesting  culture 
grew  up  at  the  court  of  Frederick  II.  in  Sicily,  and  likewise  was  extinguished  with 
its  patron. 

Greek,  as  has  already  been  remarked,  was  regarded  with  suspicion  as  the  lan- 
guage of  heresy.  As  we  see  clearly  from  the  glosses,*  the  Greek  culture  continued 
to  wane  in  the  schools  and  monasteries  of  Western  Europe  even  after  the  Caro- 
lingian  revival.  The  influence  of  the  Irish  schools  soon  spent  itself.  Scotus 
Erigena  wrote  Greek  verses, f  was  thoroughly  familiar  with  the  Greek  Fathers,  and 
made  hasty  translations  from  Greek  into  Latin,  as  in  case  of  the  writings  of 
the  Pseudo-Dionysius  Areopagita.J  His  literary  history  is  perhaps  the  best  testi- 
mony we  have  of  the  high  standing  of  the  Irish  schools  at  the  opening  of  the  ninth 
century.  On  the  other  hand,  Aquinas,  four  hundred  years  later,  who  represented 
the  culmination  of  the  movement  begun  by  Scotus,  did  not  know  Greek,  but  ob- 
tained his  translation  of  Aristotle  from  a  Flemish  monk.  §  During  this  period  a 
ready  knowledge  of  Greek  was  probably  about  as  rare  in  Western  Europe  as  a 
knowledge  of  Egyptian  hieroglyphics  is  to-day.  We  must  except  southern  Italy 
and  Sicily  from  this  statement.  Even  now  the  peasants  of  some  of  the  remote 
villages  of  Sicily  and  Calabria  speak  a  dialect  of  Greek.  ||  It  certainly  was  a  spoken 
language  in  a  considerable  part  of  Italy  up  to  the  opening  of  the  Renaissance. 
The  archives  of  Naples  show  its  official  use  up  to  the  time  of  the  Norman  con- 
quest of  that  country.  At  Nardo  and  Otranto  Greek  schools  flourished  as  late  as 
the  sixteenth  century.^ 

But  though  Greek  culture  itself  was  on  the  wane,  it  is  the  introduction  of  Greek 
thought  that  marks  the  most  important  epoch  in  the  history  of  scholasticism.  Be- 
fore Aristotle  became  the  master  of  the  schools,  scholastic  theology  had  been 
largely  ethical  and  exegetical ;  after  that  time  it  was  largely  speculative  and  met- 
aphysical. This  latter  period  is  marked  by  the  dialectical  refinement  of  the  lan- 
guage. There  is  not  the  faintest  reminiscence  of  Cicero's  sonorous  sentences  in 
the  shrill  jargon  of  the  controversialist.  The  most  practical  and  concrete  of  all 
tongues  becomes  the  medium  for  expressing  the  most  refined  of  metaphysical  sub- 
tilties.  Probably  at  no  time  in  its  existence  had  Latin  been  so  far  away  from 
home  as  at  this  period.  That  it  should  have  survived  in  the  attenuated  ether  of 
the  disputation  hall  is  most  emphatic  evidence  of  its  hardy  constitution.  In  all  its 
previous  Protean  metamorphoses  we  see  some  suggestion  of  a  faculty  developed  in 
its  previous  history.  Even  the  rude  chronicle  suggests  the  eariy  annates ;  the 
hymns  and  street  songs  suggest  the  popular  rhythms  of  the  nursery  or  of  the  triumph ; 

*  Thurot,  op.  cit.,  pp.  66-7;    108-9. 

t  Some  are  found  in  P.  L.  CXXII,  pp.  1238  et  seq.  :    also  M.  G.  H.  p.  m.  a..  Hi,  9,  a. 

X  Kaulich,  op.  cit.,  p.  68;    P.  L.  CXXII. 

gGeugueray,  op.  cit.,  18. 

\  Gebhardt,  op.  cit.,  137. 

^Muratori.Sc.  II. 


38  MEDIEVAL   AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

Christian  theological  literature  before  this  time  had  retained  some  hint  of  the  early 
Fathers  and  through  them  of  Seneca  and  Cicero.  Even  the  most  ignorant  of  the 
monks,  stammering  a  loose  story  over  the  last  cup  of  a  refectorium  banquet  finds 
some  analogy  in  the  drunken  freedman  at  the  cena  of  Trimalchio.  But  the  dialec- 
tician was  an  entirely  new  type,  and  he  was  conscious  of  the  fact.  He  frankly 
cut  loose  from  Donatus  and  Priscian  and  sailed  off  into  a  linguistic  world  of  his 
own.  Of  course,  men  like  Aquinas  wrote  correct  Latin,  Latin  that  was  from  a 
scholastic  point  of  view  excellent,  and  is  perfectly  intelligible  to  one  familiar  with 
the  technical  meaning  of  its  vocabulary.  Scholastic  Latin  performed  its  part  as 
well  as  classical  Latin  had,  a  thousand  years  before.  Perhaps  to  a  man  brought  up 
to  use  it  from  infancy  it  was  a  beautiful  language,  exciting  the  same  aesthetic 
pleasure  that  a  neat  application  of  Taylor' s  formula  excites  in  the  heart  of  a  mathe- 
matician. It  had  no  color,  no  perspective,  and  not  much  form ;  but  it  was  as 
perfect  as  compass  and  T-square  could  make  it.  This  quality  is  illustrated  in  a 
representative  sentence  like  the  following :  Illi  qui  sunt  si?tipliciter  inaequales,  si 
non  recipiunt  secundum  illam  inaequalitatem,  iniustum  fit  simpliciter  eis ;  sed 
virtuosi  sunt  simpliciter  inaequales  respectu  aliorum,  ipsos  excedentes  secundum 
virtutem  ;  ergo  si  non  recipiunt  secundum  illam  inaequalitatem,  iniustum  fit  eis. 
Another  sentence,  this  time  not  from  Aquinas,  shows  how  modem  the  word  order  is 
as  a  rule :  Intentio  nostra  in  hac  distinctione  est  quod  praebeamus  omnes  vias 
claras  et  demonstrationes  firmas  quae  faciunt  scire  quaestionem  magnam,  etc. 
Naturally,  when  language  becomes  a  sort  of  a  formula,  without  shading  or  color- 
ing, or  the  thousand  and  one  nuances  that  go  to  make  up  style,  the  linguistic  sense 
becomes  weak,  and  it  is  easy  to  insert,  without  any  feeling  of  incongruity,  what- 
ever term  chances  to  stand  in  the  mind  of  the  writer  as  the  symbol  of  an  idea, 
without  any  regard  to  its  source  or  ancestry.  The  following  quotation  perhaps  cari- 
catures this  tendency  somewhat ;  but  that  it  was  possible  at  all  in  serious  lit- 
erature proves  how  little  appreciation  for  linguistic  propriety  the  mediaeval  phil- 
osophers sometimes  had.  It  is  taken  from  a  translation  of  one  of  the  Arabic 
writers,  probably  the  Spanish  vSaracen  Averroes  :  Invarikin  terra  alkanarnihy, 
stediei  et  baraki  et  castrum  munitum  destendedyn  descenderunt  adenkirati  ubi  de- 
scendit  super  eos  aqua ' Euphratis  veniens  de  Eutein.  No  wonder  that  Bacon  con- 
sidered the  Arabic  philosopher  male  translatus.  He  attributes  the  introduc- 
tion of  foreign  words  to  the  fact  that  Latin  did  not  have  terms  for  expressing  all  the 
new  ideas  that  were  being  introduced  with  the  Arabic  philosophy.'^ 

The  Paris  schoolmen,  however,  remedied  this  defect,  and  in  so  doing  conferred  a 
benefit  upon  subsequent  thought  and  literature  that  is  not  always  recognized.  For 
while  the  importance  of  scholastic  philosophy  as  a  training  school  for  mental  dis- 
cipline, and  thus  as  a  progymnasia  of  modern  culture,  is  generally  admitted,  the 
value  of  its  contributions  to  the  lexicography  of  science  and  even  of  common  life  is 
often  overlooked.  Though  the  sphere  of  its  speculations  was  confined  largely  to 
grammar,  logic,  theology  and  metaphysics,  the  terms  that  it  created  have  entered 

*Opus  Magnum,  pp.  45-6;  De  Grammatica  :  Interpretes  non  habuerunt  vocabula  in 
Latino  pro  scientiis  trans/erendis ,  quia  non  fuerunt  primo  cotnpositae  in  lingua  Latina; 
et  propter  hoc  posuerunt  infinita  de  Unguis  alienis. —  Quae  sicut  ntulta  alia  prius  ab  His- 
panis  scholaribus  derisus  cutn  non  intelligebam  quod  legebatn,  ipsis  vocabula  maternae 
linguae  scientibus,  tandetn  didici  ab  eisdem. 


LATIN    OF    THE    MIDDLE    AGES.  39 

modern  life  with  a  much  wider  application  than  the  fact  might  indicate.  The 
schoolmen  sought  for,  and  the  best  of  them  attained  almost  absolute  precision  of 
language.  This  of  course  involved  principally  an  extension  and  modification  of 
the  vocabulary  and  did  not  affect  syntax.  The  examples  of  scholastic  Latin  already 
given  are  sufficient  to  show  that  this  latter  remained  practically  what  it  had  been 
throughout  the  Middle  Ages. 

Parts  of  words  that  had  been  lost  in  classical  Latin  were  brought  back  into  use. 
In  this  way  the  present  participle  ofesse  (ens)  was  restored  to  the  language.  Words 
that  were  rare  enough  to  be  somewhat  plastic  in  previous  Latin,  and  that  were  ety- 
mologically  suitable,  were  seized  upon  and  received  a  fixed  and  definite  technical 
signification.  So  abstractio,  which  first  occurs  in  the  later  writer  Dictys  Cretensis, 
received  its  familiar  modern  meanings  from  the  mediaeval  schools ;  in  the  original 
sense  of  taking  away,/^/'  abstractienem  albedinis  priiis  comtnixtae  (Phys.,  I,  9); 
in  the  metaphysical  sense,  cum  dicitur  iitiiversale  abstractum,  duo  intelliguntur^ 
scilicet  ipsa  natura  rei,  et  abstractio  seu  universalitas  (Sum.  Theol.,  I.,  85,  2,  2); 
in  the  sense  suggested  by  our  "  fit  of  abstraction,"  prophetiae  inspiratio  quandoque 
fit  cum  abstractione  a  sensibus  (De  Ver.,  xii. ,  9,  c).  Similarly  actualisy  which  is 
found  only  in  the  Somniuni  Scipionis  in  Roman  Latin,  has  not  only  its  original 
meaning  of  acting,  active,  but  also  the  sense  represented  in  English  by  actual,  real  as 
opposed  to  possible,  y^rwa^ — suntmagis  actuales{J}e.  Potentia,  vi.,  3,  2).  Apprehen- 
sion our  apprehension  in  a  psychological  sense,  first  appears  with  an  abstract  mean- 
ing in  a  medical  work  of  the  fifth  century.  Its  adoption  was  doubtless  facilitated 
by  the  existence  of  comprehension  which  had  been  coined  by  Cicero.  From  these 
were  fonned  apprehensivus  and  comprehensivus — valuable  words  in  English — 
where  the  distinction  between  the  root  words  is  still  maintained,  intellectus — uni- 
versalum  apprehensivus  (Contra  Gentiles,  2,  48);  essentia — comprehensiva  ofn- 
niutn  (Sum.  Theol.,  I.,  84).  Words  common  in  classical  Latin  with  a  concrete 
signification  received  an  abstract  meaning  at  the  hands  of  the  schoolmen.  For  in- 
stance conceptio  has  for  this  reason  given  us  conception  in  its  abstract  senses,  and 
conceptus  has  given  us  concept.  Conclusio  is  an  instance  of  a  word  apparently 
coined  in  the  middle  ages.  Essentia  lost  its  duritas,  and  entitas,  despite  its 
hybrid  character,  throve  and  has  survived  from  that  period.  As  Greek  was  little 
understood  by  the  schoolmen,  especially  those  of  the  classical  age  of  scholasticism, 
their  vocabulary  was  based  almost  entirely  upon  Latin,  and  this  language  in  a  cer- 
tain sense  made  good  what  it  had  lost  through  the  neglect  that  it  had  suffered  at 
the  time  of  the  early  Fathers.  It  is  possible  that  aristocr atia  and  aristocraticusj 
diaphanus  and  diaphatieitas  and  a  few  words  that  have  not  survived  in  modem 
tongues  entered  Latin  at  this  time. 

Many  new  derivatives  were  formed.  As  an  example,  we  find  in  Aquinas 
potentia,  potentialis,  potentialitas,  and  potentialiter,  of  which  only  the  first  is  foimd 
in  classical  Latin  and  the  last  in  late  Latin.  To  the  schoolmen  we  owe  such  com- 
mon words  as  improbability  [improbabtlitas),  irregularity  {irregularitas),  person- 
ality {persona litas),  and  (with  modified  meaning)  predicament  {praedicamentum), 
subsistence  [subsistentia),  and  many  adjectives  Uke  figurative  [Jigurativus),  and 
visual  ( visualis ) .  In  fact,  it  is  probable  that  by  far  the  greater  portion  of  the  words 
coined  by  the  schoolmen  and  employed  by  their  best  writers  have  been  received 
into  English  and  have  become  part  of  our  common  speech.     An  incomplete  list  of 


40  MEDIEVAL   AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

the  words  beginning  with  a  found  in  the  writings  of  Aquinas  alone,  that,  besides 
being  in  most  cases  of  mediaeval  formation,  have  entered  English  with  mean- 
ings either  given  or  suggested  by  the  schoolmen  would  include  the  following  : 
abstracter  abstractio,  acceptatio,  accidentalis,  accidentaliter,  aciualis,  actualitas, 
actualiter,  adaequatus,  aequivalentia,  antecedentes ,  application  apprehensivus,  ap- 
propriate, approximation  argumentaiivus . 

Later  we  shall  have  occasion  to  note  the  peculiar  attitude  which  the  scholas- 
tic grammarians  assumed  toward  their  classical  predecessors.  It  is  sufficient  here 
to  remark  that  there  was  the  same  spirit  of  innovation  abroad  that  we  find  mani- 
festing itself  in  the  vocabulary.  Latin  was  no  longer  crumbling  to  pieces  in  the 
hands  of  neglect,  but  it  was  being  rebuilt  and  made  habitable,  so  far  as  possible, 
by  the  rude  skill  of  the  mediaeval  artisan.  The  classical  restoration  was  yet  to 
come. 

VIII. 

Whenever  Latin  was  employed  in  writings  intended  for  a  wide  constituency,  it 
was  natural  to  introduce  into  the  language  popular  idioms  and  expressions,  and  to 
make  it  in  every  way  as  intelligible  as  possible  for  those  whose  scholarship  and 
mental  training  was  not  extensive  enough  to  permit  of  their  following  with  ease 
the  involved  sentences  and  the  technical  and  abstract  phraseology  of  more  preten- 
tious works.  With  the  growth  of  the  universities  and  the  concentration  in  single 
towns  of  thousands  of  students  of  various  nationalities,  imbued  all  of  them  with  a 
smattering  at  least  of  Latin  and  making  that  speech  their  chief  medium  of  com- 
munication from  necessity  in  daily  life  and  from  choice  in  the  lecture  room  and 
disputation  hall,  there  grew  up  spontaneously  a  sort  of  a  lingua  franca  Latin  that 
approximated  in  many  of  its  forms  very  nearly  to  the  vulgar  tongues.  A  Bologna 
jurist  uses  such  an  idiom  when  he  says  :  Scholares  non  sunt  boni pagatores.  Scire 
volunt  omAes,  mercedem  solvere  netno.  It  does  not  involve  any  very  great  strain 
upon  our  credulity  to  imagine  the  ten  thousand  students  of  Bologna  able  to  con- 
verse more  or  less  fluently  in  such  a  tongue  as  this.  Every  parish  hamlet,  every 
one  of  the  innumerable  religious  houses,  every  town  and  city,  contained  their  tens 
or  scores  or  thousands  who  employed  this  speech  with  the  unconscious  facility  of  a 
mother  tongue.  This  language  of  the  mediaeval  schools  does  not  exist  in  literary 
monuments  and  is,  like  the  sermo  plebeius  of  the  Romans,  practically  a  lost 
speech.  We  do  not  know  how  it  was  pronounced,  if  there  was  any  common 
usage  in  the  matter,  and  the  popular  Latin  that  was  written  was  always  affected 
more  or  less  by  the  sort  of  classical  cant  that  pervades  the  Goliard  poetry.  It 
does  not  contain  the  slang,  the  barrack  room  phrases,  the  colloquial  turns  that 
always  grow  up  in  a  language  which  is  used  conversationally.  We  merely  know 
that  this  school  language  probably  varied  from  more  or  less  pure  Latin,  through 
those  combinations  of  Latin  and  the  vulgar  tongues  that  we  find  in  some  of  the 
Goliard  songs,  to  the  dog  Latin,  or  Latinized  vernacular  that  Rabelais  ridicules 
in  the  Paris  scholars. 

Popular  works  written  in  Latin  still  retained  the  semblance  of  literary  form 
and  finish.  Some  of  them  are  quite  as  excellent  in  their  way  as  more  labored 
productions.  The  author  sometimes  expressly  states  that  he  has  adopted  a  style 
intended  to  be  imderstood  easily  by  his  readers.       So  Geoffrey  of  Monmouth,  in 


LATIN    OF    THE    MIDDLE    AGES.  4I 

the  introduction  to  his  chronicle,  says  :  Agresti  stylo  propHsque  calamis  contentus. 
Remember  that  he  borrows  half  of  an  immediately  succeeding  chapter  from  Gil- 
das  :  nam  si  ampullosis  dictionibus  paginatn  illevissem^  taedium  legentibus  in- 
gererem,  dtim  magis  in  exponendis  verbis  quam  in  historia  intelleganda  ipsos  com- 
morari  oporteret. 

It  has  always  been  noted  that  the  Church  hymns  probably  derived  their 
rhythmical  form  from  the  popular  poetry  of  the  Romans.  The  reverse  of  these  is 
seen  in  the  popular  songs  of  the  vagabond  students  of  the  eleventh  and  twelfth 
centuries.  The  Goliardi,  as  they  were  called  from  their  mythical  patrons  or  chief 
Golias — the  gourmand — belonged  to  the  clerical  order,  but  seem  to  have  repre- 
sented the  unschooled,  undisciplined,  vagrant  geniuses  whom  the  overcrowded 
mediaeval  schools  threw  into  the  world  with  little  other  heritage  than  a  smatter- 
ing of  literary  training,  irregular  habits,  and  that  careless  or  satirical  attitude 
toward  the  serious  problems  of  life  that  characterizes  the  devotees  to  la  vie  de 
Bohime.  They  parodied  the  hymns  of  the  Church  in  their  drinking  songs,  cele- 
brated mass  to  Bacchus,  and  used  sacred  metres  to  sing  the  praises  of  their  mis- 
tresses. Still  these  poems  are  not  without  their  merit.  Sometimes  a  delicate 
sentiment  is  found  expressed  in  almost  perfect  verse.  The  influence  of  provincial 
poetry  is  not  entirely  absent.  Spring  and  love  form  the  theme  of  many  a  stanza 
that  has  an  echo  of  the  troubadours  in  it. 

Sometimes  also  a  serious  vein  runs  through  a  poem,  oftener  the  bitter  gall  of 
satire.    Piers  Ploughman  and  Colin  Clout  have  their  archetypes  in  the 

Goliardois, 
A  gloton  of  wordes. 
And  to  the  aungel  on  heigh 
Answerde  after : 
**  Dum  rex  regere 
Dicatur  nomen  habere 
Nomen  habet  sine  re, 
Nisi  studet  iura  tenere."* 

The  tendency  of  the  mediaeval  universities  to  make  a  specialty  of  some  one  par- 
ticular faculty  favored  an  itinerant  life  on  the  part  of  the  students.  As  one  monkish 
writer  puts  it :  Urbes  et  orbem  circuire  solent  scholastici,  tit  ex  tnultis  litteris 
ejfficiantur  insani.  Ecce  quaerunt  derici  Parisii  artes  liberales,  Aureliani  auc- 
tores,  Bononiae  codices,  Salerni  pyxides,  Toleti  daemones,  et  misquam  mores. 
Their  clerical  privileges  distinguished  them  from  the  common  vagabonds,  the 
jugglers  and  strolling  players,  the  pilgrims,  saunterers,  and  mendicants  that 
thronged  the  mediaeval  highways.  This  point  of  privilege  and  superior  caste  was 
one  upon  which  they  were  apt  to  insist  strongly.  Their  attitude  toward 'laymen  in 
general  was  a  hostile  or  cojitemptuous  one  : 

Aestimetur  autem  laicus  ut  brutus, 
Nam  ad  artes  surdus  est  et  mutus. 

LaTci  non  sapiunt 
Ea  quae  sunt  vatis.f 

*  Piers  Ploughman,  v.  277,  et  seq. 

*  Burana,  124. 

tBur.,p.  74.  » 


42  MEDIAEVAL    AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

The  Goliards  lack  the  distinctive  feature  of  the  Renaissance — individuality. 
They  are  a  class ;  their  poems  are  choruses  rather  than  solos.  Like  our  col- 
lege songs,  or  negro  melodies,  or  coster  songs,  the  verses  of  the  Goliardi  are 
literary  foundlings.  Though  lyrical  in  form  they  lack  the  essential  element  of 
lyrical  poetry — personality.  We  see  through  them  not  the  author,  but  the  v^^hole 
homeless,  itinerant  qtiart  Hat  of  the  ecclesiastical  world.  We  have  seen  before 
that  the  sense  of  literary  property  was  not  strongly  developed  during  the  Middle 
Ages.  Dependence  upon  classical  models  was  not  favorable  to  abstinence  from 
plagiarism.  One  of  the  Goliard  songs  borrows  phrases  and  verses  freely  from  an- 
other, and  all  underwent  numerous  modifications  in  their  oral  transmissions  from 
singer  to  singer  and  cloister  to  cloister.  Their  unacknowledged  or  forgotten  liter  - 
ary  paternity  doubtless  favored  this.  Though  the  class  for  which  he  wrote  formed 
but  a  small  minority  in  any  particular  region,  the  reading  public  of  a  mediaeval 
Latin  author  was  not  confined  by  national  boundaries,  but  was  scattered  all  over 
Western  Europe.  This  led  to  the  diffusion  of  popular  Latin  literature  over  a  large 
area,  and,  consequently,  especially  under  the  conditions  then  prevailing,  to  a  diver- 
gence of  form  throu'^h  the  infusion  of  local  color. 

In  connection  with  this  we  might  remark  obiter  that  one  of  the  things  which  most 
surprises  a  person  studying  the  literary  history  of  this  time  is  to  see  with  what 
rapidity  a  popular  book  was  disseminated  throughout  Europe  after  its  publication. 
No  doubt  this  diffusion  of  literature  was  facilitated  by  the  fact  that  much  of  it  was 
in  a  common  language.  But  even  the  songs  of  the  troubadours  were  soon  trans- 
lated into  German  and  the  Scandinavian  and  Slavonic  dialects  as  well  as  into 
Spanish  and  Italian.  Speaking  of  the  East,  Renan  says  that  when  intercourse 
with  the  Levant  was  active,  a  book  published  at  Cairo  was  known  at  Paris  or  Co- 
logne sooner  than  the  average  German  book  is  known  in  France  to-day.*  The 
Jews  seem  to  have  been  active  intermediaries  in  this  work.  On  the  other  hand  we 
have  instances  where  a  Latin  author  takes  his  book  and  travels  all  over  Western 
Europe,  introducing  it  into  schools  and  universities.  Like  Goldsmith,  he  pays 
his  way  by  holding  disputations,  or  depends  upon  the  charity  of  the  monks. 
Anselm  the  Peripatetic  thus  took  his  Rhetorimachia  presumably  from  Milan,  where 
it  was  coniposed,  to  Piacenza,  Lucca,  the  cloister  of  San  Benigno,  Bale,  Augs- 
berg,  Bamberg,  and  Mayence.f  Wippo  seems  to  have  done  the  same.;}:  The 
Vergil  legends  diffused  themselves  from  Naples  all  over  Western  Europe  within  a 
few  years  from  the  time  when  they  first  attracted  the  notice  of  writers.  From  the 
opening  of  the  Crusades  the  scholars  and  literati  of  Roman  Christendom  seem  to 
have  taken  to  a  wandering  life,  and  to  have  peddled  their  wares  from  province 
to  province  like  the  bards  of  old.  Popular  songs  and  legends  came  into  the  pos- 
session of  street  singers,  who  migrated  like  the  birds  ;  and  a  single  season  could 
diffuse  them  over  Europe. 
/  Classical  figures  and  allusions  are  frequent  in  Goliard  poetry.  This  is  a  feature 
that  distinguishes  it  from  the  poetry  of  the  troubadours.  Antithetical  tendencies  are 
seen  in  the  literature  of  the  Romance  and  the  Latin  tongues.  In  the  former,  even 
classical  heroes  and  institutions  become  mediaeval.     Alexander  is  a  knight,  Troy 

*Op.  cit.,  p.  202. 

f  Dummler,  op.  cit.,  p.  9. 

X  Stenzel,  Gesch.  Deutschlands,  II.,  47. 


LATIN    OF   THE   MIDDLE    AGES.  43 

a  feudal  stronghold.     In   the  latter,  the  pagan  gods  and  goddesses  still  reign, 
Venus  and  Bacchus  inspire  song,  Jupiter  watches  over  the  affairs  of  men  : 

Homo  videt  faciem,  sed  cor  patet  lovi. 

Love,  wine  and  satire  form  the  usual  themes  of  the  Goliard.  Among  songs 
of  the  first  class  are  some  that  have  a  purely  classical  suggestion,  such  as  cxlix. 
and  those  immediately  following  in  the  Burana  collection.*  The  love  of 
Aeneas  and  Dido  or  of  Paris  and  Helen  is  oftenest  celebrated.  The  conversation 
of  Dido  and  Anna,  in  the  fourth  book  of  the  Aeneid,  is  thus  rendered  by  the 
mediaeval  lyricist : 

Anna,  dux, 

Mea  lux, 

Iste  quis  sit  ambigo  ; 

Quis  honor, 

Quis  color, 

Voltu  quis  intelligo  ; 

Ut  reor, 

Ut  vereor, 

Hunc  nostra  connubia 

Poscere, 

Id  vere 

Portendunt  mea  somnia.f 

The  romantic  influence  is  stronger  in  poems  relating  to  spring,  and  especially 
to  spring  conceived  of  as  the  time  when  the  poet' s  wayward  fancy  lightly  tmns  to 
thoughts  of  vernal  love  : 

Salve  ver  optatum, 

Amantibus  gratum, 

Gaudiorum 

Fax  multorum, 

Florum  incrementum, 

sings  one  ;  another  begins  with, 

Floret  tellus  floribus 
Variis  coloribus. 
Floret  et  cum  gramine. 
Vacent  iam  amoribus 
luvenes  cum  moribus 
Vario  solamine ; 

while  a  second  and  a  third  express  a  similar  sentiment  with  the  following  -.% 

Ecce  gratum 

Et  optatum 

Ver  reducit  gaudia ; 

*  Carmina  Burana,  pp.  56  et  seq. 

t  Burana,  p.  155. 

\  Du  Meril,  Poesies  populaires  Latines  anterieures  au  Xllme  Siecle,  p.  379. 


44  MEDIEVAL   AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

Purpuratum 

Floret  pratum, 

Sol  serenat  omnia ; 

lam  cedat  tristitia, 

Aestas  redit, 

Nunc  recedit 

Hiemis  saevitia ; 
and, 

Florent  omnes  arbores, 

Dulce  canrmt  volucres, 

Revirescunt  frutices, 

Congaudete  iuvenes ; 

Such  poetry  evidently  has  much  less  of  the  classical  element  in  it  than  the  Con- 
Jlictus  Veris  et  Hiemis ;  but  in  a  way  it  is  less  Teutonic.  It  breathes  the  softer 
passion  of  the  South.  However,  the  form  of  a  disputation  appears  again  in  De 
Phyllide  et  Flora.  The  two  maidens  discuss  the  merits  of  their  respective  lovers, 
one  a  soldier,  the  other  a  cleric.  Of  course  the  court  of  love — here  a  curia — 
decides  in  favor  of  the  latter ; 

Ad  amorem  clericum 
Dicunt  aptiorem. 

Another  example  of  the  disputation  appears  in  the  Cotiflicttis  Ovis  et  Linty 
where  the  theme  is  evident  from  the  title.  Others  of  a  similar  character — for  in- 
stance, between  the  heart  and  the  eye,  and  a  very  popular  one  between  water  and 
wine — are  found  in  the  English  collection  of  Goliard  poems  ascribed  to  Walter 
Mapes.  It  is  worth  noffling,  perhaps,  that  the  disputation  and  the  satire  form  a 
much  more  important  part  of  this  English  than  they  do  of  the  Continental  collec- 
tions, a  fact  indicative  possibly  of  national  taste,  if  not  of  authorship. 

The  best  known  of  the  drinking  songs  is  the  one  beginning  : 

Meum  est  propositum 
In  tabema  mori ; 
Vinum  sit  appositum 
Morientis  ori, 
Ut  dicant  cum  venerint 
Angelorum  chori  : 
**  Deus  sit  propitius 
Isti  potatori." 

This  is  really  modified  from  stanzas  of  a  poem  which  has  been  thought  so  rep- 
resentative of  the  Goliardi  as  a  class  as  to  receive  the  title  Confessio  Foetae,  the 
general  confession  of  the  whole  order.  Perhaps  this  is  the  best  secular  Latin 
rhyme  ever  written  ;  certainly  in  naive,  witty  frankness  it  equals  anything  that  we 
possess  in  that  language,  whether  classical  or  modem.*  The  poem  contains  a  per- 
sonal element.  Its  author  was  led  to  address  it  to  his  patron,  Electe  Coloniae,  to 
defend  himself  against  the  scandal  that  his  loose  life  had  occasioned,  and  to  prom- 

*  Burana,  p.  67 ;  Mapes,  p.  71 ;  Notices  des  Manuscrits,  Tome  29,  p.  266. 


LATIN    OF   THE   MIDDLE   AGES.  45 

ise  reform  in  the  future.  It  was  written  between  1162  and  1 165,  at  Pavia,  and 
marks  the  culmination  of  the  Gohard  period.  Most  of  the  songs  of  this  character, 
however,  probably  originated  in  Northern  France.  The  fact  that  this  one  was 
written  in  Italy  was  accidental,  and  proves  nothing  as  to  the  nationality  of  the 
author. 

In  bitterness  of  spirit  the  poet  confesses  his  own  instability  of  character.     He 
is  blown  hither  and  thither  like  a  leaf  in  the  wind  ; 

Cum  sit  enim  proprium 
Viro  sapienti 
Supra  petram  ponere 
Sedem  fundamenti, 
Stultus  ego  comparor 
Fluvio  labenti, 
Sub  eodem  tramite 
Nunquam  permanenti. 

He  is  like  a  ship  without  a  pilot,  or  a  bird  borne  on  in  aimless  flight.  Serious 
thoughts  and  occupations  do  not  attract  him  ; 

Mihi  cordis  gravitas 
Res  videtur  gravis  ; 
locus  est  amabilis 
Dulciorque  favis. 

Then  follows  an  account  of  the  three  things  that  have  done  most  to  estrange  him 
from  a  life  of  probity  ; 

Res  est  arduissima 

Vincere  naturam. 

In  aspectu  virginis 

Mentem  esse  puram ; 

luvenes  non  possumus 

Legem  sequi  duram, 

luvenumque  corporum 

Non  habere  euram. 

Play  also  has  its  charms  for  him,  but  when  he  leaves  it,  stripped  of  all  his  posses- 
sions, he  writes  better  verses  than  when  sluggish  with  prosperity.  Last  of  all 
comes  the  tavern  ; 

Tertio  capitulo 

Memoro  tabemam, 

Illam  nullo  tempore 

Sprevi  neque  spemam. 

He  does  not  sympathize  with  those  studious,  solitary  poets  who, 

ut  opus  faciant 
Quod  non  possit  mori, 
Moriuntur  studio 
Subditi  labori. 


46  MEDIEVAL   AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

His  inspiration  comes  from  a  different  som-ce ; 

Tales  versus  facie 

Quale  vinum  bibo ; 

Nihil  possum  facere 

Nisi  sump  to  cibo  ; 

Nihil  valet  penitus 

Quae  ieiunus  scribo, 

Nasonem  post  calicem 

Carmine  praeibo.  ^ 

Finally,  however,  comes  a  promise  to  lead  a  better  life  in  the  future,  the  doubtful 
sincerity  of  which  does  not  affect  in  the  least  our  lenient  disposition  toward  the 
penitent : 

lam  virtutes  diligo, 

Vititis  irascor, 

Renovatus  animo 

Spiritu  renascor ; 

Quasi  modo  genitus 

Lacte  novo  pascor, 

Ne  sit  meum  amplius 

Vanitatis  vas  cor. 

The  poem  has  been  translated  into  English  by  Leigh  Hunt;  and  an  older  ver- 
sion, entitled  The  Jovial  Priesf  s  Confession,  \s  found  in  Camden's  Remains.  We 
have  here  another  phase  of  those  sharp  contrasts  and  picturesque  antitheses  that 
characterized  mediaeval  society ;  feudal  chiefs  in  narrow  castles,  and  knight  er- 
rants  tasting  the  pleasures  and  hardships  of  every  clime ;  serfs  bound  to  the  soil, 
and  pilgrims  and  vagabonds  making  the  whole  world  their  home  ;  monks  passing 
the  monotonous  round  of  life  in  narrow  cloister  gardens,  and  strolling  students 
whose  curriculvun — in  the  original  sense  of  the  word — embraced  Salerno,  Oxford 
and  Salamanca ;  ascetics  and  hermits  incarnating  abstinence  and  self-denial,  and 
roving,  jolly  priests,  whose  appetite  for  the  pleasures  of  life  knew  no  satiety.  Be- 
cause the  clerical  order  embraced  all  literary  men  it  necessarily  included  the  in- 
cipient Marlowes  and  Congreves  of  mediaeval  literature.  These  men  belonged  to 
the  Middle  Ages  ;  but  it  needed  only  one  more  metamorphosis  in  mental  evolution 
to  make  them  humanists. 

Other  of  the  Goliard  songs  have  a  serious  purpose.  The  reforming  spirit  that 
animated  the  Church,  or  at  least  the  lesser  clergy  at  this  period  found  expression 
in  these  verses  of  the  highways  and  byways.  The  distinctively  popular  character 
of  this  poetry,  within  the  liberal  limits  which  its  language  set,  cannot  be  over-esti- 
mated. Ad plateas  descendamus  might  have  been  its  motto.  All  the  spirit  of  revolt 
against  corruption  in  high  places,  whether  it  were  in  court  or  curia,  was  centered 
in  it.  Strangely  out  of  harmony  with  the  general  character  of  their  poetry  as  it 
may  appear,  this  consciousness  of  a  moral  mission  was  frequently  expressed  by  the 
Goliards 

Reprobare  reprobos 

Et  probos  probare. 


LATIN    OF   THE    MIDDLE    AGES.  47 

Et  probos  ab  improbis 
Veni  segregare, 

writes  onc^     There  is  something  of  Skelton  in  the  followingf  : 

In  huius  mundi  patria 
Regnat  idolatria, 
Ubique  sunt  venalia 
Dona  spiritualia. 
Custodi  sunt  raptores 
Et  lupi  praedatores. 
Principes  et  reges 
Subverterunt  leges. 

^  Cardinales,  ut  praedixi, 

Novo  iure  crucifixi 
Vendunt  patrimonium. 
Petrus  foris,  intus  Nero, 
Intus  lupus,  foris  vero 
Sicut  agni  ovium. 

The  following  is  quoted  from  a  poem  which  begins, 


and  is  one  of  the  bitterest 


Utar  contra  vitia 
Carmine  rebelli, 

Roma  capit  singulos 
Et  res  singulorum, 
Romanorum  curia 
No  a  est  nisi  forum. 

Papa,  si  rem  tangimus, 
Nomen  habet  a  re, 
Quicquid  habent  alii 
Solus  vult  papare. 

The  period  of  the  Goliards  passed.  The  order  became  degenerate  and  was 
suppressed  by  a  series  of  decrees  issued  by  the  ecclesiastical  councils  and  courts. 
Some  of  the  strollers  took  refuge  in  the  laity,  and  a  number  of  songs  remain,  half 
Latin,  half  vulgar,  as  reminiscences  of  this  transition  period,  f  Many  of  the  poems, 
however,  survived  in  their  original  form  in  the  cloisters,  while  others  continued 
popular  at  the  universities  and  thus  became  the  progenitors  of  modern  college 
songs  J 

Turning  to  the  prose  side  of  popular  Latin  we  find  a  representative  compilation, 
taking  about  the  same  place  in  this  department  of  literatvure  that  the  Burana  col- 

*  Burana,  pp.  14  and  18. 

t  Of  the  satirical  poems  besides  those  in  the  Burana  many  are  published  by  Du  Meril,  Poesies 
Populaires,  pp.  155-87;  Poesies  inedites,  pp.  313-354;  Poesies  Populaires  ant.  au  Xllme  S.,  231 
(cf.  note).     Many  are  also  found  in  Mapes  as  already  indicated. 

XGaudeamus  Igttur  s^&ms  to  have  been  from  this  source;  cf.  Hubatsch,  op.  cit.,  p.  32. 


■,\ 


48  MEDIAEVAL   AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

lection  does  in  that  of  poetry,  in  the  Gesta  Romanorum.  In  order  to  hold  the  at- 
tention of  his  untutored  and  often  illiterate  audience,  the  mediaeval  preacher  found 
it  necessary  to  mingle  with  his  exhortations  and  homilies,  stories  and  popular  illus- 
trations from  romance  and  profane  history.  In  this  way  a  rather  hazy  and  super- 
ficial familiarity  with  the  names  of  some  of  the  classical  authors  and  with  para- 
phrases from  their  works  was  spread  among  the  people.  They  knew  of  them,  so 
to  speak,  through  hearsay  evidence.  The  priest  was  doubtless  often  as  ignorant  as 
his  parishioners  of  the  antecedents  of  the  tale  or  the  historical  environment  of  the 
events  that  he  related  for  their  edification.  Of  course  these  fables  were  rendered 
into  the  vernacular  and  received  their  moral  interpretation  from  the  individual  priests , 
but  they  passed  from  hand  to  hand  within  sacerdotal  circles  in  vulgar  Latin.  Grad- 
ually they  assumed  a  conventional  form,  stereotyped  "  morals"  were  annexed,  and 
they  were  gathered  into  collections  convenient  for  practical  use,  such  as  the  one 
already  mentioned. 

This  compilation  of  nearly  three  hundred  tales  with  their  accompanying  ' '  morals' ' 
was  probably  the  work  of  an  English  author,  and  dates  from  about  the  close  of  the 
thirteenth  century.  The  work  was  very  popular  and  has  been  translated  and  pub- 
lished in  various  editions,  both  vernacular  and  Latin,  so  that  the  character  of  the 
latter,  which  is  contemporary  with  the  beginning  of  the  Renaissance,  has  doubtless 
been  somewhat  modified.  The  tales,  however,  had  a  much  earlier  origin  than  the 
work.  We  find  them  drifting  about,  in  prose  or  verse,  through  all  the  Middle  Age 
literature,  and  they  appear  later  in  Boccaccio' s  Decameron,  Poggio'  s  Facetiae,  and  in 
scores  of  writers  who  employed  their  plots  with  more  or  less  modification  in  subse- 
quent works.  Erasmus  alludes  to  the  Gesta  when  he  is  ridiculing  the  theologians 
in  the  Encomium  Moriae.  These  considered  it  evidence  of  highest  skill  to  be  able 
to  drag  out  some  foolish  and  vulgar  tale  from  one  of  these  compilations  and  inter- 
pret it  allegorically,  tropologically,  and  anagogically.*  In  fact  at  this  time  the 
pagan  writers  also — and  it  seems  that  Ovid  was  a  favorite  in  this  respect — were  in- 
terpreted at  the  universities  with  especial  reference  to  their  supposed  mystical  or 
allegorical  meaning. 

Many  of  the  stories  in  the  Gesta  were  not  at  all  such  as  one  would  expect  to 
hear  repeated  in  a  pulpit  of  a  Sunday  morning  nowadays.  The  following,  how- 
ever, will  serve  to  illustrate  the  Latin  without  being  offensive  to  one's  sense  of 
delicacy. 

Refert  Augustinus  in  De  Civitate  Dei,  quod  Dyonides  pirata  galea  una  longo 
tempore  in  mari  homines  spoliavit  et  cepit.  Qui  cum  multis  navibus  iussu  Alex- 
andri  fuisset  quesitus  et  tandem  captus,  et  Alexander  presentatus  eum  interrogavit 
dicens  :  Quare  mare  habet  te  infestum  ?  Ille  statim  respondit :  Quare  te  orbis  ter- 
rarum  ?  Sed  quia  ego  hoc  ago  una  galea,  latro  vocor  ;  tu  vero  mundum  opprimens 
naviima  multitidine  magna  diceris  imperator.  Sed  si  circa  me  fortuna  mansuesce- 
ret,  fierim  melior ;  e  converso,  tu  quanto  infortunior  tanto  deterior.  Alexander 
respondit :  Fortunam  tibi  mutabo,  ne  malicia  tue  fortune,  sed  meritis  ascribatur. 
Sicque  ditatus  est  per  eum  ut  de  latrbne  factus  est  princeps  et  zelator  iusticie. 

*  Superest  iant  quintus  actus,  in  quo  sjimmuju  arti/icem  praestare  convenit.  His  ntihi 
stultam  aliquant  et  indictanifabulam  ex  Specula  opinor  Historiali  aut  Gestis  Romanorum 
in  medium  ad/erunt,  et  eandetn  interpretantur  allegorice ,  tropilogice,  et  anagogice.  Op. 
Om.,  Tomus  IV.,  478,  A. 


/ 


LATIN    OF    THE    MIDDLE     AGES.  49 

Carissimi,  latro  in  mari  cum  una  galea  est  peccator  in  mundo  cum  sola  vita, 
et  tamen  non  desistit  occidere  virtutes  et  spoliare  per  peccatum  quas  recepit  in 
baptismo.  Sed  Alexander,  i.  e.  princeps  vel  prelatus,  habet  talem  ad  viam  recti- 
tudinis  adducere  per  naves,  i.  e.  per  monita  sancte  ecclesie,  etc. 

This  popular,  barbarous  Latin  continued  to  be  written  and  spoken  long  after 
the  Revival  of  Learning,  not  in  a  sporadic  and  accidental  way — like  our  college 
salutatories — but  forming  the  great  bulk  probably  of  what  was  spoken  and  written 
professionally  in  the  schools  and  universities  and  monasteries,  especially  north  of 
the  Alps,  during  these  centuries.  An  interesting  and  instructive  caricature  of  this 
sermo  plebeius  of  the  Renaissance  and  Reformation  period — the  barbaries  of 
Erasmus  and  his  contemporaries — is  the  Latin  of  the  Epistolae  Obscurorum  Vi- 
roruni,  an  anonymous  pasquinade  directed  against  the  monks,  more  particularly 
those  of  Cologne,  at  the  time  of  the  Reuchlin  controversy. 

The  Letters  inveigh  against  the  same  abuses  that  Erasmus  ridicules,  but  in  a 
manner  so  broad  and  coarse  as  to  give  ofifense  even  to  the  B§.le  wit  himself.  Their 
authorship  was  long  in  dispute.  Some  even  ascribed  them  to  Erasmus  at  the  time, 
but  it  is  probable  that  they  were  principally  the  work  of  Ulrich  von  Hutten,  who 
represented  the  most  radical  element  of  the  reforming  party.*  They  would 
have  fallen  flat  had  the  vices  and  ignorance  they  depicted  not  existed,  and  their 
Latin  would  have  been  meaningless  had  it  not,  like  Josh  Billings's  or  Nasby's 
English,  contained  a  germ  of  realism  that  gave  substance  and  meaning  to  the 
caricature. 

The  theme  of  this  fictitious  correspondence  of  obscuri  viri — monks,  the- 
ologians and  university  men — was  the  gossip  and  controversies  of  the  cloisters  and 
some  of  the  every-day  incidents  that  were  supposed  to  form  the  undercurrent  of 
university  and  monastery  life.  The  fact  that  they  are  full  of  human  interest  and 
really  entertaining  and  amusing  to-day,  testifies  to  a  spark  of  genius  in  the  men  who 
wrote  them,  and  partially  explains  their  great  popularity  at  the  time  of  publication. 
As  we  are  not  concerned  with  the  theological  side  of  the  satire,  the  following  ex- 
tract from  an  epistle,  dealing  with  more  general  subjects,  will  best  serve  to  illus- 
trate the  character  of  the  work,  and  in  an  approximate  way  the  popular  Latin  of 
the  Early  Reformation  period  :  Superexcellens  necnon  scientificissmus  vir  dominus 
Orivintis  Gratius  Daveniriensis,  poeia,  orator,  et  philosophus,  necnon  theologicus 
figures  prominently  in  the  correspondence  as  the  patron  and  literary  father  of  the 
younger  letter-writers.  It  is  to  him  that  a  young  baccalaureus  addresses  the  fol- 
lowing : 

Salutem  cum  humilitate  erga  vestram  maioritatem.  Venerabilis  demine 
magister : — Venit  hue  unus  socius  qui  portavit  certa  carmina,  et  dixit  quod  vos 
composuistis  ilia.  Tunc  unus  poeta  hie  qui  habet  magnam  laudem  sed  non  est 
bene  Christianus  vidit  ilia  et  dixit  quod  non  sunt  bona,  et  quod  habent  multa  vitia. 
Et  ego  dixi :  Si  magister  Ortvinus  cotuposuit,  tunc  non  habent  vitia.  Hoc  est 
ceftum.  Et  volui  impignorare  tunicam  meam  quod  si  ilia  metra  haberent  vitia, 
tunc  vos  non  composuistis  ;  sed  si  vos  composuissetis,  tunc  non  haberent  vitia. 

Before  approaching  the  Latinity  of  the  Renaissance,  it  may  be  worth  our  while 
to  take  one  glance  back  over  the  mediaeval  history  of  Latin,  in  order  to  see  what 
elements  it  contains  that  help  to  explain  the  character  of  the  revival  that  followed. 
♦Three  authors  were  associated  in  the  work,  Hutten  being  the  principal  one. 


50  MEDIAEVAL    AND    RENAISSANCE   LATINITY. 

In  doing  this  we  may  have  to  pass  for  a  moment  beyond  the  discussion  of 
merely  literary  facts  to  the  consideration  of  the  social  and  political  conditions  which 
lie  beneath  them.  In  the  previous  pages  we  have  seen  that  from  its  period  of  cul- 
mination under  Augustus,  Latin  gradually  waned  to  almost  total  occultation  in  the 
seventh  and  eighth  centuries.  A  mere  glimmer  of  light,  a  memory  of  past  radi- 
ance, survived  in  the  Lombard  cities  and  the  Irish  cloisters.  Then  succeeded  a 
period  of  waxing,  beginning  with  the  time  of  Charlemagne,  that  finally  resulted  in 
the  brilliant  classical  revival  of  the  fourteenth  and  fifteenth  centuries.  It  is  cus- 
tomary, upon  a  superficial  view,  to  look  upon  Latin  as  a  language  that  died  some- 
time between  the  age  of  Tacitus  and  Justinian,  but  whose  galvanized  corpse  con- 
tinued to  stalk  the  earth  in  a  halting  way  for  a  decade  of  centuries  later.  From 
this  point  of  view,  subsequent  Latin  literature  would  be  a  purely  artificial  phenom- 
enon. But  there  are  no  artificial  phenomena  in  history.  No  one  would  have  been 
more  surprised  than  the  mediaeval  clerk  or  the  humanist  at  such  a  view  of  Latin. 
For  them  that  language  had  had  a  continuous  existence  from  the  time  when  its  ac- 
cents first  were  heard  in  the  Forum  and  the  Senate  House.  They  looked  forward 
to  its  continuing  the  great  immutable  literary  language  of  the  future.  Without  this 
belief  and  this  faith  the  revival  of  classical  letters  would  have  been  impossible  in  the 
form  in  which  it  did  occur.  Under  the  conditions  which  existed  that  revival  was  a 
necessary  step  in  the  evolution  of  European  culture.  It  was  the  inevitable  result 
of  past  forces  and  events,  and  as  such  as  important,  as  pregnant  a  fact  in  its  way 
as  any  other  literary  period. 

Though  we  have  but  the  unsubstantial  basis  of  a  speculation  for  the  statement, 
it  is  probable  that  had  Italy,  through  some  political  or  physical  convulsion,  ceased 
to  exist  as  a  factor  in  European  history,  the  Renaissance,  as  we  understand  that 
word,  would  never  have  occurred.  France  was  without  doubt  intellectually  the  most 
precocious  of  modern  European  nations.  In  the  Scholastic  Latinity  of  the  Paris 
University  or  the  Romance  Latinity  of  the  Goliardi  we  possibly  have  something 
approximating  to  the  ultimate  form  that  Latin  letters  would  have  assumed  before 
being  supplanted  by  a  native  literature,  had  an  indigenous  culture,  unaffected  by 
transmontane  influences,  prevailed.  Italy  became  the  dominant  force  in  directing 
European  cultiure  because  of  her  vast  heritage  from  antiquity,  a  heritage  of  senti- 
ment as  well  as  of  culture,  of  feeling  as  well  as  of  intellect.  Classical  culture  had 
been  latent,  not  extinguished,  in  Italy.  And  beneath  this  was  the  other,  more 
important  factor.  Classical  ideas  were  the  ideals  of  the  people,  not  of  a  class. 
The  revival  of  ancient  letters  grew  up  in  Italy ;  it  would  have  had  to  grow  down 
in  any  other  country. 

This  does  not  necessarily  imply  that  literary  culture  was  more  general  in  Italy 
than  in  the  other  lands  of  Europe,  though,  as  we  shall  see,  this  was  to  a  certain 
extent  the  case.  It  was  inspired  by  different  conceptions  and  ideas  here  than  else- 
where. We  cannot  presume  to  attempt,  nor  have  we  the  space  for,  a  comprehen- 
sive discussion  of  this  subject.  We  can  only  illustrate  the  fact  by  a  reference  to 
what  were  perhaps  the  two  most  important  legacies  that  antiquity  left  peculiarly  to 
Italy.  One  was  the  conception  of  the  political  continuity  of  the  Roman  nation  ; 
the  other  was  the  continuance  of  a  distinctively  secular  as  distinguished  from  a 
clerical  culture. 

A  mere  casual  glance  at  Italian  history  dviring  the  Middle  Ages  does  not  reveal 


LATIN    OF    THE    MIDDLE     AGES.  5 1 

any  very  essential  differences  between  the  political  and  social  condition  of  that 
country  and  that  of  the  countries  north  of  the  Alps.  The  landscape  presents  the 
same  succession  of  feudal  castles  and  walled  towns,  of  noble  hunting  preserves  and 
serf-tilled  fields.  But  if  instead  of  viewing  these  things  from  the  long  range  of 
history,  we  could  have  actually  been  present,  it  is  probable  that  we  should  have 
been  able  to  discover  under  all  this  something  that  distinguished  Italy  from  con- 
temporary France  or  Germany.  The  feudal  noble,  instead  of  being  illiterate,  had 
learned  the  rudiments  of  ancient  lore  in  the  neighboring  municipality,  where  re- 
mains of  civic  life  had  persisted  from  the  time  of  the' Republic.  He  regards  the 
Church  as  a  political  quite  as  much  as  a  religious  institution.  His  own  and  the 
neighboring  estates  bear  testimony  in  ruins  and  legends  to  the  ancient  enlighten- 
ment and  power  and  glory  of  a  race  that  he  regards  his  own.  The  Scipios  and 
Catos  are,  in  the  vague  sphere  of  his  historical  imagination,  as  real  and  present  to 
him  as  King  Alfred  is  to  the  average  Englishman  to-day.  He  shares  these  feel- 
ings and  sentiments  with  the  merchant  aristocracy  of  the  towns.  He  still  regards 
transalpine  strangers  as  barbarians.  Yet  his  conception  of  the  political  continuity 
of  Rome  is  not  the  clear,  definite  conception  of  the  publicist,  a  Holy  Roman  Em- 
pire. It  is  indefinite,  because  he  has  only  a  vague,  hazy  idea  of  what  Rome  really 
was.  It  is  a  sentiment  rather  than  a  theory.  Now  it  is  the  Republic,  now  the 
Empire  that  appeals  most  strongly  to  his  imagination  ;  or  more  often  still  he  does 
not  distinguish  between  the  two.  When  this  sentiment  seeks  to  find  definite  ex- 
pression in  acts,  as  in  case  of  Rienzi,  inconsistences  and  contradictions  appear,  an 
odd  medley  of  bizarre  conceptions,  that  make  the  political  realization  of  this  ideal 
evidently  a  pathetic,  congenital  impossibility.  But  its  effectiveness  as  a  source  of 
literary  inspiration  is  not  hampered  in  the  least  by  this.  Rather  it  is  furthered, 
if  possible,  because  it  always  remains  in  the  realm  of  the  ideal. 

Even  after  making  allowance  for  the  fact  that  classical  allusions  in  mediaeval 
Latin  poetry  were  largely  conventional,  we  have  constantly  recvuring  evidence  of 
the  attitude  in  which  Italy  stood  toward  the  ancient  political  world  in  the  works  of 
the  panegyrists  and  chroniclers.  When  Sergius  III.  was  elected  Pope,  in  904,  he 
signalized  his  possession  of  the  chair  of  the  pontiffs  by  an  administration  of  marked 
political  success.  Vulgarius  addressed  a  poem  to  him  in  which  the  ancient  glory 
of  Rome  is  recalled  : 

Aurea  priscorum  reparat  nunc  saecla  virorum, 
Scipiadas  claros,  Fabios  gentemque  togatam, 
Fasces  curules  anulos  ac  paludamenta, 
Palmatas  tunicas,  trabeam  falerasque  nitentes. 
Imperium  renovat  heroum  nomenque  priorum. 

This  emulation  of  an  antiquity  that  was  ever  present  to  the  Italians  is  indicated 
in  the  reference  to  the  Punic  Wars  in  a  Pisan  poem  written  in  honor  of  the  victory 
of  Pisa  over  the  Saracens,  in  1088.  This  ^is  the  more  interesting  because  it  is 
contained  in  one  of  those  popular  rhymes  with  which  the  townsmen  celebrated 
of  the  stirring  incidents  of  their  civic  and  military  life  : 

Inclytorum  Pisanorum  scripturus  historiam 
Antiquorum  Romanorum  renovo  memoriam  ; 


52  MEDIAEVAL    AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

Nam  extendit  modo  Pisa  laudem  admirabilem 
Quam  olim  recepit  Roma  vincendo  Carthaginem.* 

In  the  watch  song  of  Mantua  already  quoted  Greece  is  fraudulenta  Graecia,  and 
the  whole  sympathy  of  the  Italian  is  with  his  mythical  ancestors.  We  can  hardly 
imagine  an  Italian  writer,  like  Hildebert  of  Lavardin,  putting  into  the  mouth  of 
mediaeval  Rome  such  words  as  these  : 

Maior  sum  pauper  divite,  stante  iacens  ; 

Plus  aquilis  vexilla  crucis,  plus  Caesare  Petrus  :f 

Even  the  peasant 

Favoleggiando  colla  sua  famiglia. 
De  Troiani,  e  di  Fiesole,  e  di  Roma, 

and  the  Neapolitan  lazzaroni  with  their  grotesque  Vergilian  legends  cherished  a 
vague  feeling  of  proprietorship  in  the  heroes  whose  exploits  they  no  longer  under- 
stood. J  As  we  approach  the  dawn  of  the  Renaissance  this  pride  of  lineage  be- 
comes heightened,  especially  in  men  of  poetic  imagination.  Dante  is  inspired 
with  patriotic  enthusiasm  at  contemplating  the  great  deeds  of  the  Romans,  and 
traces  back  the  history  of  Italy  uninterrupted  from  his  own  time  to  that  of 
Aeneas.^  Petrarch  speaks  of  the  Romans  in  the  same  familiar,  matter-of-fact  way 
that  he  does  of  contemporary  Italians,  or  that  we  do  of  the  Pilgrim  Fathers.  || 

The  municipal  organizations  of  Italy  retained  many  traces  of  Roman  institu- 
tions.^ Some  of  the  guilds  of  the  Italian  cities  may  date  back  to  the  early  collegia. 
There  is  a  notice  of  the  arts  of  Naples  in  the  sixth  century,  and  of  a  collegium  of 
fishers  at  Ravenna  in  the  eighth.  We  might  fancy  as  much  for  the  bakers  from 
the  resemblance  of  Pompeian  loaves  to  those  of  modern  Italy. 

It  is  possible  that  some  forms  of  imperial  corruption  and  luxury,  from  which 
most  of  Western  Europe  seems  to  have  been  purged,  survived  in  Italy,  though  this 
may  have  been  partly  due  to  closer  contact  with  the  East.  Unnatural  vices  are  hinted 
at  in  the  Inferno,**  and  they  shot  up  such  a  rank  growth  in  Italy  at  the  time  of  the 
Renaissance  as  to  suggest  the  thought  that  their  seeds  were  already  present  in  the 
nation.  In  the  tiinth  century  Ratherius  has  to  warn  his  priests  against  the  custom 
of  introducing  lewd  songs  and  female  dancers  at  banquets,  tf  The  survival  of  a 
heathen  custom  may  explain  the  warning  addressed  by  a  bishop  of  Verona  to  his 

*Cf.  also  Ottonis  Frisingensis  Chronicon,  M.  H.  G.,  sc.  20,312,  11,  19-20;  inter  nuncios 
interpellatyVirtutem  liberalitatis  antiquorum  Romanorujn  eis  ad  tnemoriam  reducens , 
per  haec  postulata  ab  eis  adepisci  existiinaret. 

f  Hildebert  de  Lavardin,  Notices  des  Manuscrits,  T.  28,  part  2,  p.  289. 

X  Cf.  Comparetti,  op.  cit.,  p.  202. 

§  For  instance  in  the  sixth  canto  of  the  Paridiso. 

II  Ad.  Fam.  8,4:  Coquus,inquain,quod  non  latet,  apud  maiores  olivt  nostras  vilissi- 
mum  mancipiuvi,victa  demuvi  Asiain  pretio  haberi  coeptuvi.  Nunquani  utinani  armis 
Asiam  vicissemus,  ne  unquavi  suis  ilia  deliciis  nos  vicisset.     (Cf.  Livy.,  XXXIX.,  6.) 

\In  civitatuni  quoque  dispositione  ac  reipublicae  conservatione  antiquoruvt  adhuc 
Romanorum  imitantur  solertiain. 

**  Cf.  the  fifteenth  canto  of  the  Inferno. 

tfP'  L.  CXXXVI.,p.  292,  A  :  Tecum  \%c.'in  conviviis\  syntphonia  et  omnia  musicorutn 
genera,  cantorum  lenocinia,  saltatricum  pestis. 


LATIN    OF   THE    MIDDLE   AGES.  53 

priests,  directing  them  to  forbid  what  seems  to  have  been  the  common  custom  of 
singing  carmina  diabolica  over  the  dead,  at  night.* 

A  pleasanter  side  of  this  vein  of  ancient  life  running  through  Italian  history 
is  afforded  bj  the  continuance  there  of  secular  culture.  This  term  may  be  under- 
stood as  meaning  two  things.  It  may  refer  to  the  study  of  ancient  pagan,  as  dis- 
tinguished from  Christian  literature.  Or  it  may  indicate  that  this  study  was  a 
favorite  pursuit  of  the  laity  as  well  as  of  the  clerical  classes.  This  second  aspect 
of  the  question  is  one  that  most  particularly  concerns  us  in  the  case  of  Italy,  but 
the  first  has  a  not  unimportant  bearing  upon  our  subject. 

The  hostile  attitude  that  the  Church  assumed  toward  pagan  literature  has  al- 
ready been  remarked.  That  this  hostility  continued  more  pronounced  in  Italy 
than  elsewhere  may  be  a  negative  indication  of  the  fact  that  secular  letters  were 
more  popular  in  that  country,  so  that  the  former  feeling  of  rivalry  was  not  al- 
lowed to  die  out.  No  such  antagonism  to  the  classical  writers  seems  to  have  been 
present  in  the  Irish  and  English  schools.  Quite  the  reverse.  Alcviins  writes 
that  he  is  exerting  himself  to  intoxicate  his  pupils  with  the  strong  wine  of  an- 
cient learning."}-  And  although  in  his  later  years,  when  under  the  influence  of 
continental  environment  and  Italian  ideals  to  some  extent,  he  turned  his  thoughts 
more  exclusively  to  theology,  the  sum  total  of  his  influence  was  humanistic.  If 
his  pupil  Rabanus  takes  the  Gregorian  position,  it  is  because  his  opposition  to 
profane  literature  is  based  upon  ethical  grounds  rather  than  upon  considerations  of 
faith  or  dogma.  J  Even  today  people  might  be  found  who  would  not  consider 
Ovid  and  Catullus  just  the  authors  to  put  into  the  hands  of  young  persons  and  to 
make  the  basis  of  their  literary  training.  Much  of  the  popular  literature — lascivae 
cantilenae — was  as  corrupt  in  content  without  any  redeeming  elegance  of  form, 
drummers'  stories  of  the  looser  sort,  the  adventures  of  the  Decameron  and  Hep- 
tameron  without  their  literary  polish.  But  in  Italy  the  old  partisan  feeling  re- 
mains. The  spirit  of  antiquity  has  never  been  so  far  subdued  as  to  become  per- 
fectly innocuous.  It  is  irreligion,  corruption  of  faith  more  than  corruption  of 
morals,  that  disturbs  the  Italian  ecclesiastic. 

If  we  compare  Italy  with  Gaul,  whose  literary  culture  rivaled  that  of  the  mother 
country  of  Latin  at  some  periods  of  the  Empire,  a  difference  too  great  to  be  ex- 
plained by  the  political  vicissitudes  of  a  single  century  appears  after  the  close  of 
the  first  invasion.  The  letters  of  Sidonius  Apollinaris  describe  Gallic  country 
seats  of  the  fifth  century  in  whose  owners'  libraries  the  secular  writers  and  those 
of  the  Church  found  an  equally  honorable  position.^  A  hundred  years  sufficed 
practically  to  annihilate  this  culture,  and  by  the  time  of  Gregory  it  had  disap- 
peared. In  the  Italy  of  Cassiodorus,  who  belongs  to  the  same  century  with 
Gregory  though  about  half  a  generation  before  him,  the  interest  in  profane  litera- 
ture is  so  active  that  the  study  of  the  sacred  writings  languishes,  and  the  wordly 

*  P.  L.  CXXXVI.,  p.  1853:  Cantus  et  choros  mulierunt  in  atrto  ecclesiae prohibite: 
Cartnina  diabolica  quae  super  mortuos  nocturnis  horis  vulgus  cantare  solet — vetate. 

t  Ep.  43,  PI.  C,  208,  B.  Aliis-sanctarum  mella  scripturarum  ministrare  satago,  alios 
vetere  antiquarunt  disciplinarutn  mero  inebriare  satago. 

\  Prohibetur  Christianus  legere  figinenta  poetarum,  quia  per  oblectatnenta  inanium 
/abularum  tnenteni  excitat  ad  incitaTnenta  libidinunt. 

I  Cf.  Ep.  29.    M.  G.  H.  s.  a.,  8.    P.  L.  LVIII.,  484,  B. 


54  MEDIEVAL    AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

writers  displace  those  of  the  Church.*  In  the  tenth  century,  when  the  cathedral 
and  monastery  schools  of  Charles  were  just  taking  root  in  the  North,  a  crazy  gram- 
marian of  Ravenna  created  a  public  tumult  by  preaching  what  seems  to  have  been 
a  sort  of  pagan  crusade,  f  "  Like  all  the  Italians"  he  neglected  the  other  arts  for 
grammer — i.  <?.,  poetry  and  rhetoric — and  inspired  by  the  shades  of  Vergil,  Horace, 
and  Juvenal,  began  to  revile  the  sacred  writings  and  extol  those  of  the  poets. 
This  new  creed  found  many  adherents  and  was  put  down  with  fire  and  sword. 
Through  the  obscure  and  prejudiced  account  of  the  monkish  chronicler  we  doubt- 
less see  a  premature,  mediaeval  attempt  at  a  classical  revival.  Another  writer  of 
this  period  laments  that  the  youth  are  so  carried  away  with  enthusiasm  for  poetry 
that  they  waste  their  time  in  schools  of  rhetoric  (?)  and  divert  high  gifts  of  genius 
to  these  unworthy  pursuits.  |  Ratherius  protests  against  their  having  more  concern 
about  the  marriage  of  Mercury  and  Philology  than  that  of  Christ  and  a  faithful 
soul,  and  their  inquiring  more  diligently  into  the  occasion  of  the  spots  upon  the 
moon  than  those  upon  their  own  consciences.  ^ 

The  quotation  recently  cited  from  Cassiodorus  also  suggests  the  important  fact 
that  not  only  were  secular  letters  studied  in  Italy  in  his  time,  but  that  they  were 
taught  by  lay  teachers,  probably  successors  of  the  grammarians  who  taught  at 
Rome  and  in  the  other  Italian  cities  in  the  time  of  the  Empire.  ||  We  have  evi- 
dence that  such  lay  masters  continued  all  through  the  Middle  Ages.  They  taught 
what  were  probably  private  schools.  To  this  class  belong  Felix  and  his  nephew 
Flavian,  who  taught  at  Ticinum  in  the  seventh  centi»y,  the  latter  of  whom  was 
the  master  of  Paulus  Diaconus.  ^  Probably  Honorius  and  loaniccius,  of  Ravenna, 
who  were  famous  in  the  **  sixth  and  seventh  centuries  as  teachers  of  grammar  and 
poetry  and  the  Vilgardus  mentioned  above  were  of  this  class.  A  papal  canon  of 
826  directs  masters  and  teachers  skilled  in  literature  and  the  liberal  arts  be  ap- 
pointed, ff  and  another  canon  twenty-seven  years  later,  in  the  darkest  period  of 
Italian  history,  speaks  of  teachers  of  the  liberal  arts  as  being  at  that  time  rarely 
found  among  the  common  people.:): J     But  that  they  should  have  existed  at  all  is 

*P.  L.  LXX.,  iioo.  Cutn  studia  saecularium  litterarutn—fervere  cognoscerem — gra- 
vis siino  sum,  J'ateor,  dolore  permotus ,  quod  script oribus  divinis  niagistri  publici  deessent, 
cum  mundani  auctores  celeberrima procul  dubio  traditione poller ent.  Cf.  also,  Var.  Ep.  2, 
3  ;    2,  IS ;    3,  II ;    M.  G.  H.  s.  c,  10,  and  P.  L.  LXIX.,  501  et  seq. 

■f-Rec.  10,  23.  Quidam,  Vilgardus  dictus,  studio  artis  gratntnaticae  magis  assiduus — 
sicut  Italis  setnper  mos  fuit  artes  negligere  ceteras,  illam  sectare. — Is  enim  cum  ex  scien- 
iia  suae  artis  coepisset  inflatus  superbia  stultior  apparere,  quadetn  node  assumpsere  dae- 
mones  poetarum  species  Virgilii  et  Horatii  atque  luvenalis,  apparentes  illifallaces  retule- 
runt  gratias  quoniam  suorum  dicta  volufninum  carius  amplectens  exerceret.  —  Hisque 
daemonuvifallaciis  depravatus  coepit  multa  turgida  docere  Jidei  sacrae  contraria,  dicta- 
que  poetarum  per  omnia  credenda  esse  asserebat. 

X  M.  G.  H.,  s.  3,  534.  Studiis  incitati  carminum,  ludo  insistentes poetico,  ad  naeniarum 
garrulitates  alta  diverterunt  ingenia. 

§  P.  L.  Frequenter  sermonem  habent  de  nuptiis  Mercurii  et  Philologiae ,  rarum.  vet 
nullum  de  copula  Christi  etfidelis  animi — diligenter  scrutantur  unde  tnacula  in  luna,  sed 
advertere  nolunt  si  macula  sit  in  conscientia. 

I!  Cf.  Suet,  de  Grammaticis,  3. 

\  Cf.  Hist.  Long. :  M.  G.  H. 

**  Mur.  Script.  I,  493  ;  2,  151. 

ff  Magistri  et  doctores  constituantur  qui,  studia  litterarum  liberaliumque  artium  ha- 
bentes,  dogmata  assidue  doceant. 

XX  Si  liberalium  artium  praeceptores  in  plebibus,  ut\assolet,  raro  inveniuntur,  tam-en 
divinae  scripturae  magistri  nullatenus  desint. 


of   T«»         

■JlsriVERSiTT 


LATIN  OF  THE  MIDDLE  AGES,  55 

what  distinguishes  Italy  from  other  lands.  A  century  later  Ratherius  writes  that 
in  addition  to  those  who  attended  the  episcopal  and  monastery  schools  there  were 
those  who  apud  quemlibet  sapientem  conversati  sunt.  In  the  time  of  Louis  the 
Second  there  are  reported  to  have  been  thirty-two  philosophic  men  of  distinguished 
learning  according  to  mediaeval  ideas,  at  Beneventum  alone.*  Some  of  these 
were  doubtless  private  teachers,  unattached  to  any  institution.  For  the  following 
century  it  is  sufficient  to  say  that  Peter  Damaniani  and  Lanfranc,and  the  founder 
of  the  Roman  law  revival,  Imerius,  were  lay  teachers  for  part  of  their  lives.  In 
documents  of  the  tenth  and  eleventh  centuries  names  of  magistH  and  scholastici 
who  were  evidently  laymen  appear  frequently,  f  As  in  imperial  times,  teachers 
become  very  wealthy  from  the  gains  of  their  profession.  The  schools  were  attended 
by  the  young  nobles,  as  we  have  already  mentioned,  as  well  as  by  those  who  were 
destined  for  the  Church.  The  contrast  between  Italy  and  Germany  in  this  respect 
is  indicated  in  the  panegyric  addressed  to  Henry  the  Third  by  Wippo  : 

Hoc  servant  Itali  post  prima  crepundia  cimcti 
Et  sudare  scholis  mandatur  tota  inventus. 
Solis  Teutonicis  vacuum  vel  turpe  videtur 
Ut  doceant  aliquem,  nisi  clericus  accipiatur. 

The  persistence  of  secular  letters  and  lay  culture  in  Italy  doubtless  accoimts  for 
the  existence  of  a  certain  rationalistic,  semi-modem  spirit  among  the  Italians  of 
the  Middle  Ages.  Ratherius  mentions  them  as  above  all  other  nations  despisers 
of  the  canon  law  and  the  clerg>'.  Frederick  the  Second  could  laugh  at  an  ex- 
communication and  his  realm  scarce  felt  the  inconvenience  of  an  interdict  that 
would  have  humiliated  and  imperilled  any  sovereign  of  northern  Europe.  From 
his  court  emanated  the  liberal  skepticism  of  Epicurus,  with  its  Umis  est  interitus 
hominis  et  iumentorum,  to  reappear  later  with  Valla  as  an  ethical  code.  A  Pytha- 
gorean society  seems  to  have  existed  in  the  Etruscan  cities.  %  Scholasticism  of  the 
extreme,  hair-splitting  kind  never  got  a  firm  hold  in  Italy.  |  Juristic  studies  and 
medicine  prevailed  at  the  universities.  Political  conditions  and  continuous  tradition 
from  classical  times  accounted  for  this  in  case  of  law,  but  in  case  of  medicine, 
especially  at  Salemum,  it  was  due  in  part  to  Arabic  influence.  || 

Finally,  there  seems  to  have  been  in  Italy  throughout  the  Middle  Ages  some 
sense  of  form  and  style,  a  taste  for  literary  excellence  that  we  rarely  find  else- 
where during  this  period.  The  indirect  evidence  of  this  is  found  in  the  smooth- 
ness of  Italian  verse  as  compared  with  that  of  the  northern  countries,  the  variety 
of  metre,  the  frequent  classical  allusions,  the  pagan  spirit  which  frequently 
breathes  through  the  poems  of  the  Peninsula.     The  literary  revival  in  France  in 

*  Mur.  Script.  2,  279,  A  :  Tempore  quo  Ludovicus  imperavit,  scilicet  Lotharii  filius, 
triginta  duos philosophos  Beneventum  habebat.  Quo  vocabulo prisci  illi  adpellare  consue- 
vere  artes  sectantes  hunianiores. 

f  Giesebrecht,  op.  cit.,  7  et  seq. 

X  Gebhardt,  op.  cit.,  80:  Les  principales  villes  de  Toscane  et  de  Puille  renfermaient  une  so- 
ciete  secrete  de  pythagoriciens  auxquels  Amauld  de  Villeneuve  fut  affilie.    Cf.  id.,  81. 

g  Gebhardt,  op.  cit.  57;   Thurot,  op.  cit.,  qa. 

I  Cf. .Giesebrecht,  op.  cit.,  35,  the  account  of  Constantinus  Afer,  the  Carthagenian  monk  who 
had  studied  at  Bagdad  and  translated  many  Greek  and  Arabic  medical  works  into  Latin  for  the 
benefit  of  the  Casiniensian  monastery. 


£6  MEDIAEVAL   AND    RENAISSANCE    LATIN  ITY. 

the  twelfth  and  thirteenth  centuries  came  from  Italy,  and  that  land  was  a  source 
of  inspiration  for  the  men  of  letters  who  rendered  famous  in  its  time  the  court  of 
Henry  the  Second  of  England.*  Law  seems  to  have  driven  letters  north  of  the 
Alps  for  a  period.  We  are  told  that  the  teachers  before  Anselm  and  Lanfranc 
came  into  France  were  hardly  to  be  compared  to  the  strolling  clerks  of  the  next 
generation.  In  fact  the  Goliardi  themselves  may  have  transplanted  the  first  seed- 
lings of  their  literature  from  Lombardy,  which  was  in  the  eleventh  century  the  fons 
sapientiae — as  a  contemporary  writer  puts  it — of  Europe.  The  poem  which  was 
most  representative  of  them  was  written  in  Italy.  They  seem  to  have  derived 
from  Italian  sources  some  of  the  pagan  spirit  that  characterized  their  songs. 
They  were  the  popular  representatives  of  the  Epicurean  doctrines  that  prevailed 
at  the  court  of  Frederick  11.     As  they  themselves  confess  : 

Magis  credunt  luvenali 
Quam  doctrinae  prophetali, 
Vel  Christi  scientiae  ; 
Deum  discunt  esse  Bacchum, 
Et  pro  Marcu  legunt  Flaccum, 
Et  pro  Paulo  Vergilium. 

The  spirit  here  represented  is  quite  Italian,  more  characteristic  of  Italy  at  least 
than  of  any  other  country  at  this  time.  But  we  have  another  poem  that  was  cer- 
tainly written  in  Lombardy,  in  the  latter  half  of  the  eleventh  century,  that  repro- 
duces all  the  pagan  feeling  of  Italian  poetry.  It  is  a  sort  of  spring  idyl  written  in 
leonine  elegiacs  and  published  with  the  title  Versus  Eporedienses,-\  a  love  poem  the 
theme  of  which  is  the  conversation  of  a  poet  and  a  young  maiden  upon  the  banks  of 
the  Po.  He  promises  her,  for  her  love,  all  the  treasures  of  the  world  and  finally 
the  immortality  of  verse.     The  poem  opens  with  the  spring  exordium  : 

Tempus  erat  florum,  quod  fons  est  omnis  aniorum ; 

the  maiden  traces  her  ancestry  to  the  gods  ; 

Si  proavos  quaeris,  dis  vim  fecisse  videris. 
Sanguine  de  quorum  me  sapit  omne  forum. 

A  long  enumeration  of  the  riches  which  the  amorous  poet  will  prodigal  upon  his 
mistress  follows,  a  list  that  gives  us  an  interesting  and  suggestive  hint  of  the  opu- 
lence and  luxury  of  the  Lombard  cities  at  this  time.  In  the  closing  lines  there  is 
a  eulogy  of  poetry  and  a  proclaiming  of  the  immortality  of  the  Muses  that  is  either 
pagan  or  Renaissance  in  its  spirit  : 

Sum  sum  sum  vates,  Musarum  servo  penates, 

Subpeditante  Clio  quaeque  futura  scio. 
*         *         * 

Musa  mori  nescit,  nee  in  annis  mille  senescit, 

Durans  durabit,  nee  quod  amavit  abit. 

Quod  decet  ore  teri  vivit  dictamen  Omeri, 

Et  facit  esse  deum  quem  coluit  Nereum. 

*  John  of  Salisbury  had  crossed  the  Alps  ten  times,  and  had  made  two  tours  through  south- 
em  Italy.     Policraticus,  i,  4.     Walter  Napes  had  at  least  been  in  Rome, 
t  Published  by  DUmmler,  op.  cit. 


LATIN    OF    THE    MIDDLE   AGES.  57 

Indeed,  and  this  is  a  fact  having  its  bearing  upon  both  mediaeval  Latin 
and  that  of  the  Renaissance,  the  night  of  the  Dark  Ages  in  Italy  was  like  these 
summer  nights  of  Britain  described  above,  where  the  evening  twilight  melts  into 
the  morning  dawn.  Letters  had  been  at  home  in  Italy  so  long  when  the  final 
breaking  up  of  the  Empire  came  that  they  had  permeated  all  the  strata  of  society, 
had  put  root  too  deep  to  be  eradicated  even  by  the  passing  deluge  of  a  barbarian 
invasion.*  In  the  rude  Merovingian  age,  when  all  sympathy  with  learning 
seems  to  have  disappeared  from  Northern  Europe,  the  Lombard  princes  still 
cherished  the  waning  light  of  letters  in  their  dominions,  f  The  glory  of  ancient 
Rome  continued  to  be  a  source  of  inspiration  and  hope  to  the  Italian,  a  bond  of 
common  sympathy,  the  only  element  of  conscious  nationality  that  survived,  an 
ideal  after  which — so  far  as  it  was  revealed  to  him — he  tried  to  regulate  his  social 
and  political  life.  |  The  laymen,  even  if  he  produced  little  in  literature,  still 
read  his  Vergil  and  his  Horace  ;  ^  with  him  the  blind  superstition  of  religious 
life  was  tempered  with  ray  of  liberal  enlightenment ;  his  lay  culture  withstood  the 
all-absorbing  influence  of  the  church.  ||  Neither  romanticism  or  scholaticism  ever 
either  completely  submerged  or  dominated  his  intellectual  life  ;^  but  those  studies 
which  were  based  most  directly  upon  ancient  thought,  grammar  and  law  and 
medicine,  appealed  most  strongly  to  his  interest  and  ambition.  In  his  literature 
the  presence  of  artistic  ideals  manifests  itself,  more  especially  in  the  department 
of  poetry,  and  even  though  it  be  but  part  of  a  conventional  tradition,  the  form 
and  features  of  his  verse  are  determined  to  a  greater  extent  than  elsewhere  by 
pagan  figures  and  mythology.** 

One  word  remains  to  be  said  upon  mediaeval  Latin  as  a  whole,  apart  from  its 
different  periods  of  development  and  its  employment  in  different  spheres  of  litera- 
ture. We  cannot  judge  this  language  justly  if  we  insist  upon  regarding  it  from  the 
point  of  view  of  classical  scholars.  It  was  an  instrument  for  the  expression  of 
thought.  It  was  not  regarded  by  those  who  employed  it  either  as  a  mental  universal 
exerciser,  or  an  instrument  for  philological  and  historical  investigations.  Its  literary 
crudeness  was  a  fact  of  culture  rather  than  of  language,  a  feature  that  it  possessed 
in  common  with  the  vulgar  tongues.  Had  it  been  a  dead  language,  it  would  have 
retained  the  form  it  first  received  in  death,  or  have  disappeared  entirely.    Its  users 

*  Nicht  mit  volligem  Unrecht  konnte  mann  behaupten  dass  Italian  in  Bezug  auf  die  Cultur 
ein  Mittelalter  gar  night  gehabt  hat.    Korting,  A.  R.  I.,  p.  93. 

f  The  Lombard  prince  Arrichis  and  his  wife  Adilperga  and  their  son  Romaldus  are  men- 
tioned by  Paulus  Diaconus  as  patrons  of  letters.     In  the  epitaph  of  the  first  this  is  expressly 

mentioned  ; 

Ornasti patrium  doctrinis,  tnoenibus,  atilis. 

\  Sismondi,  Histiore  des  Republiques  Italiennes,  11,  34,  36,  40,  166,  255. 

g  Die  Italienische  Laie  las  seinen  Virgil  und  Horaz,  aber  schrieb  keine  Biicher.  Wittensbach, 
Geschichtsquellen,  I.,  293.  Comparetti  partially  questions  this  view.  He  associates  the  desire 
of  the  Italian  laity  to  be  initiated  into  classical  culture  with  the  development  of  vernacular  liter- 
ature ;  but  fails  to  explain  why  this  influence  of  the  vernacular  should  have  been  peculiar  to  Italy. 
o.  c,  190. 

II  La  cultura  e  poesia  d'ltalia  conserve  in  parte  un  caratterre  laico,  e  oppose  una  continua  re- 
sistenza  alle  forse  assorbenti  dell'elemento  chiesastico.     Ronca,  o.  c,  90. 

^Cf.  Comparetti,  p.  251. 

**  Names  of  pagan  deities  appear  often  in  Italian  prose.  For  instance,  Nelli,  Prior  of  the 
Church  of  the  Sacred  Apostles,  Florence  writes  with  reference  to  Petrarch's  return  from  his  Ger- 
man trip  :  Pro  cuius  felici  reditu  summo  lovi  assiduas  preces  fudi.     Cochon,  o.  c,  Ep.  lO. 


58  MEDIAEVAL   AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

looked  upon  it  as  a  living  language.  It  was  as  natural  that  the  clerk  should  have 
his  language  as  it  was  that  the  layman  should  talk  a  vulgar  idiom,  a  lingua  laica.* 
The  Latin  language  was  grammaHca,  the  language  of  definite  form  and  rule  and 
structure,  while  the  lingua  laica  was,  in  the  eyes  of  the  mediaeval  scholar,  the 
floating,  lawless,  shifting  dialect  of  the  masses,  something  savoring  of  * '  leeks  and 
garlic ' '  and  ostracized  forever  from  good  society  by  the  streak  of  servile  blood  in 
its  veins. 

If  we  except  some  constructions  that  were  occasional  in  classical  Latin,  such  as 
the  use  of  quod  clauses  for  the  infinitive  subject  accusative,  and  the  loose  use  of  the 
subjunctive  and  the  modern  word  order,  the  syntax  of  the  better  Middle  Age  writers 
is  not  very  different  from  that  of  the  Romans.  Their  prose  does  not  lack  perspic- 
uity and  clearness.  Occasionally,  as  in  the  sermons  of  St.  Bernard,  it  rises  to  the 
higher  graces  of  literary  style.  Luitprandt,  of  Cremona,  in  the  tenth  century,  and 
Roger  Bacon,  of  England,  wrote  Latin  prose  that  does  not  fall  far  short  of  that  of 
the  later  Empire. |  But  this  Latin  must  be  judged  according  to  its  own  laws  and 
standards. 

In  the  time  of  Charles  there  was  an  effort  to  restore  Latin  to  its  ancient  form. 
Einhard,  as  we  have  seen,  copied  the  style  and  language  of  Suetonius.  His  con- 
temporary and  friend.  Lupus  of  Ferrieres,  was  a  humanist  in  ideals  and  impulses, 
and  would  have  brought  Latin  back  to  its  Ciceronian  standard.  J  But  this  feeling 
was  foreign  to  the  great  mass  of  Latin  writers  of  the  Middle  Ages.  The  field  of 
view  of  many  of  those  who  sought  to  mould  their  style  on  ancient  usage  reached 
no  farther  back  than  the  Vulgate.  That  book  is  quoted  by  a  ninth  century  gram- 
marian as  an  authority  superior  to  that  of  the  classical  writers.  It  is  almost  heresy 
to  suppose  that  a  Greek  construction  could  creep  into  a  good  orthodox  book  like 
the  Latin  Bible,  and  Donatus  must  make  way  for  the  Holy  Scriptures.  | 

A  few  centuries  later,  when  scholasticism  had  bred  a  feeling  of  independence 

*Cf.  Thurot,  op.  cit.,  p.  131  :  Latinorum  populoruin  guidatn  laid  dicuntur ,  et  quidetn 
clerici. — Laid  vera  dicuntur  habere  idiomata—quae  docentur  pueri  a  niatribus  et  a  paren- 
tibus. —  Clerici  vero  Latinis  dicuntur  habere  idiomata—et  istud  docenter  pueri  in  scholis  a 
gravtmaticis.     Thurot  quotes  this  from  a  tenth-century  grammarian. 

t  Luitprandt  sometimes  gives  up  the  quod  clauses  even,  and  Bacon  had  modern  ideas  about 
a  critical  revision  of  texts.  This  is  what  he  says  about  the  Vulgate  :  o.  c,  page  46;  Probatum 
est  quod  codices  Latini  sunt  omnino  corrupti. — Ex  translatione  mala  haec  accidit  et  cor- 
ruptione  eius  per  Latinos  ;  nee  est  remedium  nisi  de  novo  transferantur,  vel  ad  singulas 
radices  corrigantur . 

ICompare  his  letters  passim  (i,  5,  8, 16,  37,  62,  104);  P.  L.  CXIX.,  433,  A.  Atnor  litterarum 
ab  ipso  fere  initio  pueritiae  inihi  est  innatus,  nee  earum.,  ut  nunc  a  plerisque  vocantur, 
superstitiosa  otia  fastidio  sunt.  Et  nisi  intercessisset  inopia  praeceptorum  et  longo  situ 
collapsa  priorum  studia  paene  interissent,  largiente  Domino,  nieae  aviditati  satisfacere 
forsitan  potuissem  :  and  also  P.  L.  CXXX.,  434,  A.  Dictatus  nostra  aetate  confecti  displi- 
cerent,  propterea  quod  ab  ilia  Tulliatia  ceterorutnque  gravitate ,  quafn  insigne  quoque 
Christianae  religionis  viri  aemulati  sunt,  oberrarent. 

\  Thurot,  o.  c,  page  85.  Multi  dicunt  opus  non  est  dicere  "ego  lego"  aut  "ego  legam," 
quia  "  lego"  cu7n  dicit  aliquis  aut"  legi"  aut  "legam"  personam  pariter  absolute  demon. 
strut  et  tejnpus.  Sed  nos,  quod  divinarum  Scripturarum  plura  instrtiunt  testimonia,  haec 
dicere  non  formidamus .  Of  such  expressions  as  da  mihi  bibere,  da  mihi  manducare ,  he  says, 
Quatn  figurant  locutionis  multi  Graecant  esse  magis  volunt  quam  Latinam.  Nos  vero  Lati- 
nam  eam  tenemus,  quia  in  divinis  scripturis  eam  invenimus.  And  again.  Quod  vero  dicit 
Donatus  quia  clam  praepositio  casibus  servit  ambobus,  quaerat  lector:  ego  autem  non  me- 
tnoror  ubi  accusativo  in  divinis  Scripturis  serviat  casui. 


LATIN    OF   THE   MIDDLE    AGES.  59 

and  confidence  in  the  mediaeval  schools,  Middle  Age  literature  itself  was  made 
a  basis  for  grammar,  upon  a  par  with  the  Vulgate  and  the  classical  citations  of 
Priscian  and  Donatus.  In  the  Doctrinal  of  Alexander  de  Villedieu,  a  metrical 
grammar  that  was  supreme  in  the  schools  during  the  century  preceding  the  Re- 
naissance, we  find  the  following  : 

Accentus  normas  legitur  posuisse  vetustas  ; 
Non  tamen  has  credo  servandas  tempore  nostro. 

And  in  a  commentary  upon  the  poem  we  are  told  that  while  Priscian  gave  rules 
for  noims  employed  in  his  time,  these  need  not  necessarily  be  observed  in  case  of 
words  of  later  formation  ;  *  and  Horace  is  quoted  to  support  the  position  of  the 
commentator. 

Similar  independence  is  observable  in  the  new  prosody.  The  elaborate 
classification  of  the  hexameter  has  already  been  mentioned.  Elision  was  allowed 
in  ancient  verse,  but  is  not  to  be  favored  in  modern  verse,  non  quia  non  liceat, 
sed  qiioniam  rustico  modo  prolatum  videtur.  Rhyme  and  rhythmical  verse,  like 
that  of  the  Goliards,  has  become  the  subject  of  elaborate  rules  of  prosody. f 
The  tendency  to  take  liberties  with  the  language  in  poetry  was  carried  to  great 
excess  sometimes.  Writers  seem  actually  to  have  revelled  in  barbarisms  and 
solecisms ,  the  poet  should  coin  new  words  freely,  such  as  canotiicare,  tigridior, 
ursior ;  he  should  combine  antethetical  words,  employ  indeclinable  words  as  de- 
clinable, change  quantities,  transpose  prepositions, — do  anything  to  create  what  it 
seems  to  have  been  thought  would  be  a  pleasing  impression  of  surprise  upon  the 
part  of  the  reader.  \ 

But  this  was  the  extreme,  the  abnormal  manifestation  of  what  was  within 
moderate  bounds  the  rule.  Latin  was  looked  upon  as  a  living  language,  sui 
iuris,  neither  in  its  infancy  or  its  dotage,  and  it  was  treated  accordingly.^ 

There  is  very  little  that  is  akin  in  the  mediaeval  and  the  modern  man.  For 
this  reason,  perhaps,  neither  the  language  nor  the  literature  of  the  Middle  Ages 
appeals  to  us.  The  Roman  gentleman  of  the  first  century  or  the  Florentine  lit- 
terateur of  the  fourteenth  would  be  an  interesting  man  to  meet,  a  companion,  one 
whom  we  could  understand  and  take  into  our  sympathies.  But  the  monk  or  the 
schoolman  has  a  sort  of  Chinese  foreignness  about  him,  the  strangeness  of  our  in- 
tellectual antipodes.  With  a  few  exceptions  we  take  up  the  writings  that  pleased 
him  with  the  curiosity  of  the  investigator  rather  than  with  the  enjoyment  of  the 
reader. 

♦  Thurot,  o.  c,  page  113.  Priscianus  dabat  regulas  de  noniinibus  in  temporexsuo  usita- 
tis.  Sed  cum  ilia  i^sc.  notnina  Graeca  et  Barbara primae  declinationis)  serius  accepta  es- 
sent,  non  obstat  quin  bene  sub  genere  neutro  reponantur.  Et  hoc  est  quod  dicit  Horatius 
in  poetria  sua  :  Multa  renascentur  quae  iam  cecidere,  cadentque  quae  nunc  sunt  in  honore 
vocabula.    Sic  volet  usus. 

f  Thurot,  o.  c,  453  et  seq. 

X  Compare  the  quotations  from  GeoflFrey  Vinesauf  and  Eberhard  von  Bethune  in  Francke, 
Lateinische  Schulpoesie,  page  19. 

§K6rting,  A.  R.  I.,  page  203  :  Das  Mittelalterliche  Latein  will  betrachtet  sein  als  das,  was  er 
•war  :  nicht  als  eine  kiinstliche  Biichersprache,  nicht  als  eine  durch  Unwissenheit  und  Unfahig- 
keit  verschuldete  Entsellung  des  alten  Schriftlateins,  sondem  als  eine  lebende  Sprache,  die,  wenn 
auch  immerhin  ihre  Elemente  theoretisch  und  in  Anschluss  an  altlateinlsche  Grammatiken 
gelehrt  wurden,  doch  auch  durch  den  miindlichen  Gebrauch  uberliefert  wurde. 


6o  MEDIAEVAL   AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

If  the  round  of  thought  of  the  mediaeval  clerk  was  narrow,  if  his  intellectual 
life  was  sterile,  it  was  natural  that  the  language  that  expressed  that  life  should  be 
arid  and  barren  too.  The  Latin  of  the  Middle  Ages  is  not  an  elegant  language, 
one  of  force  and  vigor  or  of  varied  literary  expressiveness.  But  it  is  a  living 
language,  as  its  very  self- adaptation  to  its  new  environment  proves.  It  was  the 
medium  in  which  mediaeval  culture  functioned,  and  through  which  that  culture 
has  been  expressed  to  us. 


PART   TWO. 

LATIN   or  THE   RENAISSANCE. 

I. 

We  have  seen  in  the  previous  chapter  that  the  literary  barrenness  of  the  Middle 
Ages  was  due  primarily  to  the  predominance  of  intellectual  and  spiritual  ideals 
and  systems  of  thought  that  were  unfavorable  to  the  development  of  individuality, 
that  trimmed  and  pruned  men  into  conformity  with  the  monastic  or  clerical  stand- 
ard, and  discouraged  that  freedom  and  spontaneity  which  is  necessary  for  the  de- 
velopment of  genius.  Of  course,  in  the  complex  interrelations  of  social  life  it  is 
impossible  to  single  out  every  influence  that  was  at  work  in  moulding  the  thought 
and  letters  of  the  Mediaeval  period,  or  to  trace  out  fully  to  their  ultimate  sources 
in  the  external  conditions  peculiar  to  that  age  the  immediate  causes  of  its  literary 
sterility.  We  have  seen  that  a  vivid  though\  transient  revival  of  the  grand  con- 
ception of  a  world  empire  under  Charles  the  Great  brought  with  it  also  a  prema- 
ture revival  of  literary  activity.  But  true  literature,  in  the  artistic  sense  of  the 
word,  could  only  be  recovered  through  the  medium  of  the  vulgar  speech.  That 
speech  itself  was  kept  in  a  sort  of  social  eclipse  by  the  presence  of  its  elder  sister, 
until  it  burst  suddenly  upon  the  world  in  full  maturity  with  Dante.  We  are  not 
overlooking  the  fact  that  a  vigorous  native  literature  existed  before  Dante's  time. 
But  the  consciousness  of  immortal  genius,  of  a  literary  masterpiece,  of  the  possi- 
bility of  literature  existing  as  a  separate  profession  and  aim  in  life  became  with 
him  once  more  something  real.  Emulation  and  a  new  ideal  were  awakened.  If 
such  things  could  be  attained  in  the  vulgar  tongue,  how  much  greater  the  possible 
achievements  of  those  great  masters  who  were  to  awaken  again  the  lyre  of  ancient 
Rome.  Dante  himself  had  acknowledged  Vergil  as  his  master,  and  had  first  con- 
templated writing  his  own  great  epic  in  Latin  verse.  Latin  still  had  the  reverence 
of  all  Western  Exirope  as  the  great  medium  of  letters,  as  the  world  language.  Her 
sway  in  this  respect  was  still  centuries  from  its  close.  It  is  not  strange,  then, 
that  wherever  secular  education  rendered  possible,  and  the  presence  of  a  great 
master  whose  memory  was  still  vivid  in  the  minds  of  the  people  rendered  inevi- 
table the  awakening  of  literary  aspiration,  the  devotees  at  the  shrine  of  the  Muses 
should  turn  their  first  attention  to  the  great  masters  of  antiquity  and  to  the  literary 
idiom  in  which  they  wTote. 

The  conception  of  literary  immortality  was  not  entirely  a  stranger  to  the  Middle 
Ages.  A  certain  amount  of  aspiration  or  self-confidence  in  this  respect  must  be 
assumed  in  order  to  explain  an  author's  writing  at  all.  Naso,  one  of  the  courtiers 
of  Charles  the  Great,  thus  commences  the  prologue  to  his  eclogues  : 

Caesareis  Carolus  sapiens  haec  auribus  hauri 
Carmina  quae  nulla  sunt  peritura  die. 


62  MEDIAEVAL    AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

But  this  cento  or  paraphrase  from  Ovid  does  not  imply  that  sort  of  literary  in- 
spiration upon  the  part  of  the  writer,  that  modestly  audacious  consciousness  of 
fame,  that  we  find  in  Petrarch  where  he  sings  : 

E  sua  fama,  che  spira 

In  molte  parti  ancor  per  le  tua  lingua, 

Prega  che  non  estingua.  * 

It  is  to  Laura  the  personification  of  his  highest  aspirations  rather  than  to  the 
mundane  Laura  of  flesh  and  blood  that  Petrarch  sings  in  such  passages  as  these. 
The  listless  ennui,  the  acedia  of  the  cloister  has  given  place  to  the  restless,  as- 
piring melancholy  of  genius  working  toward  new  and  ever  attainable  ideals,  and 
to  that  manifestation  of  heightened  subjectivity  that  we  find  in  modem  literature 
and  has  been  named  by  the  Germans  Weltschmerz. 

But  it  is  its  inspiration  only,  not  its  form,  it  is  this  conception  of  literary  im- 
mortality as  something  again  attainable  and  worth  striving  for,  that  Latin  litera- 
ture derived  from  Dante.  And  it  is  wonderful  with  what  enthusiasm  this  new 
idea  was  embraced  by  the  generations  of  Latinists  that  immediately  followed  him. 
Perhaps  the  extreme  directness  and  personality  of  the  Divine  Comedy  contributed 
to  produce  this  result.  Latin  letters  had  rendered  imperishable  the  renown  and 
glory  of  that  long  line  of  heroes  that  extended  from  Achilles  to  Caesar  and  Pom- 
pey  and  Augustus.  While  the  lamp  of  learning  was  extinguished  the  features  of 
their  successors,  even  of  Charlemagne  and  Barbarossa,  became  dim  and  distorted 
in  the  fitful  light  of  Romance.  Now,  with  the  reenlightenment  of  the  world, 
through  the  revival  of  classic  letters,  a  new  race  of  heroes  was  to  receive  the  canon- 
ization of  literature,  and  to  become  immortalized  through  the  poems  and  histories 
of  a  new  generation  of  writers.  Petrarch  expresses  this  creed  more  than  once 
in  the  Africa  :  | 

Quisquis  enim  se  magna  videt  gessisse,  necesse  est 
Diligat  aeternos  vates  et  carmina  sacra. 

Aeternos  connoted  Latinos  with  Petrarch  and  with  those  who  succeeded  him. 
His  own  works  in  the  vulgar  tongue,  those  of  his  friend  Boccacio,  and  even  the 
Divine  Comedy  itself  were  less  esteemed  among  the  learned  than  the  Latin  works 
of  their  respective  authors.  Manetti,  who  lived  a  century  after  Dante,  prefaced 
his  lives  of  these  three  poets  with  the  explanation  that,  as  their  reputation  with 
the  learned  rested  mainly  upon  their  Latin  works,  it  was  his  object  especially  to 
emphasize  the  merit  of  their  Italian  writings,  in  order  to  secure  for  these  among 
scholars  that  appreciation  quae  in  plebecula  hactenus  latere  videbatur.\ 

Dante' s  Latin  works  belong  to  the  Middle  Ages  rather  than  to  the  Renais- 
sance, or  at  least  to  the  very  dawn  of  'that  classical  revival  that  culminated  in 

♦  Canzone  2,  in  Morte  di  Madonna  Hama,  stanza  7,  o.  c,  page  102. 

f  Africa,  IX.,  97. 

\  A  curious  illustration  of  the  superior  dignity  of  Latin  writings  in  the  mind  of  Petrarch  is 
given  by  Nolhac,  o.  c,  page  51,  note  4.  It  is  a  quotation  from  a  Pisan  memoir,  as  follows  :  lo 
mi  trovai  unafiata  in  Lombardia  e  visitai  tnesser  Francesco  a  Milano  il  quale  per  sua  cor^ 
tesia  mi  tenne  seco piu  di.  E  stando  uno  di  con  lui  net  suo  studio,  lo  domandai  si  v'avea  il 
libra  di  Dante,  etni  respose  di  si ;  sorge  e  cercato  fra  suoi  libri  il  sopradetto  libretto 
chiamato  Moncachia  e  gettollomi  innanzi.  In  ep.  sen.  v  3,  however,  Petrarch  calls  Dante, 
Dux  nostri  eloquii  volgaris. 


LATIN    OF    THE    RENAISSANCE.  6;^ 

Italy  a  century  later.  We  are  told  that  he  began  the  Divine  Comedy  in  Latin, 
even  that  he  wrote  several  cantos  in  that  language  before  finally  deciding  to 
compose  it  in  the  vernacular.  The  first  lines  of  this  poem,  though  quoted  differ- 
ently, are  usually  given  by  his  early  biographers  as. 

Ultima  regna  canam  fluido  contermina  mundo, 
Spiritibus  quae  late  patent,  quae  praemia  solvunt 
Pro  meritis  cuicumque  suis. 

There  were  also  four  Latin  translations"  of  the  poem,  one  of  which  dates  from 
as  early  as  1380.  A  couple  of  Latin  eclogues,  whose  authenticity  is  questioned,* 
are  published  in  Dante's  collected  works.  They  are  occasional  poems,  written  in 
reply  to  similar  compositions  addressed  to  himself.  There  is  something  of  the 
conventionality  of  literary  exercises  about  them,  that  gives  little  hint  of  either 
originality  or  genius  on  the  part  of  their  author,  though  they  suggest  in  no 
dubious  way  Dante's  great  Roman  '^maes^fo,^^  as  the  following  introduction  to  the 
first  eclogue  sufficiently  testifies  : 

Vidimus  in  nigris  albo  patiente  lituris 

Pierio  demulsa  sinu  modulamina  nobis. 

Forte  recensentes  pastas  de  more  capellas. 

Tunc  ego  sub  quercu,  mens  et  Meliboeus  eramus  : 

Dante's  Latin  works  illustrate  the  fact,  however,  that  in  respect  to  form  the 
poetry  of  the  Middle  Ages  was  vastly  better  than  its  prose. f  Verse  lends  itself 
more  easily  to  semi- artificial  forms  of  expression  ;  the  similarity  of  theme  as  well 
as  of  form  kept  alive  the  influence  of  classical  models  ;  and  centos  were  more 
readily  employed  where  memory  was  assisted  by  metre. 

The  prose  of  Dante  belongs  to  literary  Latin,  not  to  the  popular,  Romanesque 
Latin  of  the  popular  chronicles  and  the  Ges^a  Ronianoruni.  But  his  style  is  not 
purified  in  the  least  from  the  thousand  and  one  corruptions  or  modifications  that 
theological,  and  especially  scholastic,  literature  had  introduced.  Besides  a  few 
letters  we  have  a  geographical  or  cosmographical  monograph  entitled  Quaestio  de 
Aqua  et  Terra,  interesting  as  an  example  of  the  pre-Baconian  way  of  discussing 
such  a  subject ;  a  political  treatise  of  considerable  importance  De  Monarchia, 
which  was  once  condemned  as  heretical,  and  is  by  far  the  most  celebrated  of 
Dante's  prose  works  ;  and  De  Vulgari  Eloquentia^  which  is  in  some  respects  in- 
trinsically the  most  interesting  of  the  three  to  a  modern  reader,  despite  the  fact 
that  it  is  incomplete.  There  are  a  number  of  notices  regarding  the  early  dialects 
and  the  vernacular  literature  of  the  Romance  tongues  in  this  work  that  are  interest- 
ing and  valuable,  and  we  are  inclined  to  be  surprised  at  the  extent  to  which  the 
previous  popular  literature  had  become  a  subject  for  study  and  comparison  with 
Dante.  In  discussing  the  dialects  of  Latin,  as  he  recalls  the  Romance  languages, 
he  gives  the  Italian  the  preference  over  the  Langue  d'Oil  and  the  Langue  d'Oc, 
quia  magisvidetur  inniti  Gramniaticae  {i.  e.,  Lalinae)  quae  communis  est ;  quod 
rationabiliter  inspicientibtis  videtur  gravissimum  argumentum.  He  excludes 
Sardinian  from  the  Italian  literary  dialects,  quoniam  soli  sine  propria  vulgari  esse 

*  Macri-Leone,  o.  c,  pp.  48-54. 
f  Also  later  in  Roman  period. 


64  MEDIEVAL    AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

videntur,  Grammaticam  tamquam  simiae  homines  imitantes  :  nam  *  domus  mea ' 
et  *  Dominus  meus '  loquuntur.  He  speaks  of  the  Roman  dialect  as,  non  vul- 
gare,  sed  potius  tristiloquium,  Italorum  vulgarium  omnium  turpissimum.  We 
are  told  of  the  Langue  d'Oil,  quod  propter  sui  faciliorem  ac  delectabiliorem  volgar- 
itatem,  quicquid  redactum  sive  inventum  est  ad  volgare  prosaicum  suum  est :  vi- 
delicet bibilia  cum  Troianorum  Roi7ianoruvique  gestibus  compilata,  et  Arturi 
regis  ambages  pulcherrimae.  And  of  the  Langue  d'Oc  he  says,  quod  vulgares 
eloquenies  in  ea  primitus  poetati  sunt,  tamquam  in  perfectiori  dulciorique  loquela. 
In  the  chapter  entitled,  De  Varia  Cortstructione  qua  Utendum  est  in  Cantibus, 
after  citing  illustrations  from  ten  Romance  poets  he  concludes  with  the  following 
reference  to  the  classical  authors:  Et  fort  as  sis  utilissi??ium  foret  ad  illam  (sc. 
supremam,  i.  e.,  optimum  constructionem)  habituandam  regulates  vidisse  poetas, 
Virgilium  videlicet,  Ovidium  in  Metamorphoseos,  Statium  atque  Lucanum,  nee 
non  alios  qui  usi  sunt  altissimas  prosas,  ut  Tullium,  Livium,  Plinium,  Fronti- 
ntim,  Paulum,  Orosium,  et  multos  alios  quos  amica  solitudo  nos  visitare  invitat. 
Arnica  solitudo  is  an  oft-repeated  refrain  in  Petrarch.  This  passage  is  the  nearest 
to  a  prophecy  of  the  Renaissance  of  anything  we  find  in  Dante's  Latin. 

It  is  hardly  necessary  to  point  out  the  barbarisms  and  solecisms  in  the  above 
quotations.  The  -language  is  mediaeval,  with  scarcely  a  suggestion  of  classical 
influence  in  it.  With  the  rise  of  a  popular  literature  in  the  vulgar  tongues  the 
circle  of  Latin  readers  was  rapidly  growing  smaller,  and  there  seems  to  have  been 
little  premonition  of  the  reaction  in  favor  of  that  language  that  was  soon  to  come. 
According  to  Boccaccio,  Dante  wrote  his  great  poem  in  Italian  partly  from  this 
consideration  ;  because  liberal  studies  were  abandoned  by  all,  and  even  the  divine 
works  of  Vergil  and  the  other  great  poets  were  fallen  into  little  esteem  and  gen- 
erally 'neglected.'^  The  colloquial  use  of  Latin,  even  in  official  business,  was 
probably  becoming  much  less  common  than  it  had  been  in  the  previous  centuries. 
Numerous  instances  that  seem  to  prove  the  contrary  might  be  cited,  but  certainly 
during  the  next  two  hundred  years,  when  every  facility  for  the  acquisition  and 
mastery  of  the  classical  languages  was  provided,  and  their  study  was  prosecuted 
with  an  enthusiasm  and  devotion  that  were  unknown  even  when  they  were  flourish- 
ing as  national  tongues,  no  such  retrograde  movement  could  have  taken  place 
otherwise  as  to  justify  Erasmus'  statement  that  it  was  merely  employed  formally 
even  in  ecclesiastical  councils  and  great  embassies,  and  that  the  actual  business  was 
even  then  transacted  in  French,  f 

It  is  probable  that  during  the  whole  Renaissance  period  the  tendency  to  con- 
fine the  colloquial  use  of  Latin  to  the  scholarly  minority  was  becoming  more  and 
more  marked.  There  was  a  great  gap  growing  up  between  the  popular  Latin  of 
the  monasteries  and  universities  and  the  Latin  of  the  humanists,  that  tended  to 

*  Veggendo  It  liberali  studi  del  tutto  essere  abbandonati, — veggendo  le  divine  opere  di 
Virgin o  e  quelle  degli  alter i  solenni poeti  venute  in  non  cater e  e  quasi  refiutate  de  tutti. 
Vita  di  Dante.       ' 

f  Ciceronianus,  Op.  Om.;  I,  1004,  C  and  D  :  Neque  multo  maior  usus  in  conciliis,  ubi 
singuli paucis  aperiunt  quod  videtur,  idque  Gallice  aut  Germanice. — Quid  igitur  superest 
usus,  nisi  forte  in  legationibus  qua  Rotnae  praesertiin  Latine  peraguntur ,  ex  more  ntagis 
quayn  ex  animo,  et  magnificentiae  causa  potius  quam  utilitatis  gratia  ?  Hie  itaque  praeter 
salutationis  officium  nihil  agitur :  quod  est  serium  privatim  Uteris  et  Gallicis  colloquiis 
peragitur. 


LATIN    OF   THE   RENAISSANCE.  65 

bring  the  former  into  disrepute,  while  the  cultivated  vernacular  tended  to  displace 
it  entirely.  In  other  words,  a  repetition  of  the  process  that  went  on  at  Rome  in 
the  classical  age  was  taking  place  ;  the  literary  language  was  becoming  more  and 
more  estranged  from  the  vulgar  dialects.  But  the  analogy  stopped  here  ;  for  in 
the  latter  case  it  was  the  literary  idiom  that  survived,  though  in  a  limited  sphere 
of  usefulness,  and  the  quasi-plebeian  Latin  of  the  clerical  commons  that  disap- 
peared. 

But  if  the  practical  use  of  Latin  in  official  business  and  among  the  literary 
commonality  was  becoming  less  general,  its  elegant  use— if  we  may  employ  the 
term — within  the  comparatively  restricted  sphere  left  to  it,  suffered  no  detriment 
from  this  fact,  and  its  literary  purity  was  probably  furthered  by  it.  It  was  the 
only  medium  employed  in  formal  communications  ;  it  was  the  colloquial  language 
of  scholars."^ 

As  we  shall  see  later,  though  Erasmus  knew  neither  Italian  or  English,  he 
spent  years  in  those  countries,  published  books  at  Venice  and  gave  instruction  at 
English  universities.  Two  centuries  after  Dante,  then,  a  period  almost  as  long 
as  that  which  separates  the  age  of  Milton  from  our  own,  Latin  still  held  its  own 
as  the  speech  of  the  literary  aristocracy  of  Europe.  More  than  that.  During 
these  two  centuries  it  had  regained  much  of  its  former  elegance  and  purity  ;  so 
that  from  a  merely  formal  point  of  view  it  was  hardly  to  be  distinguished  from  that 
written  by  the  more  cultivated  Romans.  If  the  literary  monuments  of  the  period 
have  not  attained  as  high  a  position  in  the  world's  esteem  as  those  of  the  former 
age,  it  is  because  they  lack  inspiration  and  vital  connection  with  the  life  of  the 
day,  not  because  of  any  defect  in  the  medium  through  which  they  have  been  ex- 
pressed to  us.  We  can  hardly  imagine  Politian  or  Erasmus  or  their  contemporaries 
as  conscious  of  any  artificial  relation  to  their  subject  because  of  their  writing  in 
Latin.  The  words  came  like  those  of  their  mother  tongue,  only  more  fluently 
perhaps  when  a  subject  requiring  a  loftier  form  of  expression  was  before  them.f 
The  artificiality  lies  deeper  than  the  form  or  mastery  of  the  language.      It  is 

*A  perfect  colloquial  master  of  Latin,  however,  may  not  have  been  so  common  as  we  are  in- 
clined to  think.  Some  of  ^the  best  known  of  the  humanists  did  not  speak  it ;  even  Niccolo  di 
Niccoli,  the  Florentine  connoisseur,  was  among  this  number.  A  passage  from  Muretus  is  inter- 
esting in  this  connection,  and  also  as  throwing  some  light  on  Transalpine  Latinity  in  the  six- 
teenth century.  The  quotation  is  from  the  58th  chapter  of  the  Variae  Lectiones,  which  opens 
with  an  account  of  a  visit  paid  to  Muretus  by  some  German  travellers  ;  "  Interfuerat  illi  ser- 
tnoni  ac  colloquio  nostro  Darius  Bernardus ,  iuvenis  et  festivo  ingenio  et  Sanctis  plane 
atque  incorruptis  moribus,  qui  eis  digressis ;  Verutn  omnino,  inquit,  est  quod  dicitur, 
in  nullis  hotninibus  hoc  tevtpore  praeterquain  in  transalpinis  provtptani  atque  expeditafn 
reperiri  Latine  loquendi facultatevt.  Vel  ii,  qui  viodo  abiertait,  ut  nusquain  in  loquendo 
haerent,  nusquant  titubant,  nusquam  offendunt,  ut  omnia  in  numerato  habent,  ut  tota 
eorunt  sine  ullo  iinpedimento  ac  salubris  decurrit  oratio  !  At  nostri  hotnines,  et  iant  ii 
qui  sibi  e  studiorufu  laboribus palloretn  et  inacieni  et  senium  contraxerunt,  si  quando 
Latine  loquendum  \est,  ut  luctantur,ut  sudant ,  ut  anhelant  I  Credas  eos  magna  vV  ex 
intis  pulmonibus  verba  eruere ;  cum  istis  contra  sine  ulla  cura  ac  cogitatione  iugis 
quaedatn  ac  beata  Latinarunt  vocum  copia  ultro  ex  ore  manare  ac  decurrere  videatur. 
Est  istuc  quidem,  inquain,  ita  ut  dicis,  Dari ;  sed  tamen  habet  et  Italia  praecelaros  viros, 
quique  et  ornatissime  scribant  et  disertissime  cum  opus  est  loquantur. 

f  The  poverty  of  the  vernacular  as  compared  with  Latin  was  felt  by  the  early  prose  writers: 
Cf.  Sienese  manuscript  quoted  by  Comparetti,  o.  c,  page  193  :  Le  cose  spirituali  non  si possono 
si  propriatnente  esprimere  per  paravole  vulgari  come  si  sprintonoper  latina  e per  grani- 
matica,per  la  penuria  dei  vocabuli  volgari. 


66  MEDIAEVAL    AND    RENAISSANCE   LATINITY. 

found,  as  it  was  to  a  certain  extent  in  the  Roman  classical  writings,  in  the 
estrangement  from  popular  life  and  sympathies  which  that  language  created. 
Literature  must  have  its  roots  in  the  ground.  Under  other  conditions  it  is  like 
a  potted  palm,  vigorous  and  flourishing  in  its  growth  of  leaves,  but  seldom  bear- 
ing fruit. 

II. 

Though  Petrarch  might  have  stood  in  filial  relation  to  Dante  so  far  as  age  was 
concerned,  his  maturity  falls  in  a  period  that  is,  from  a  humanistic  point  of  view, 
as  remote  from  that  of  the  earlier  poet,  as  if  centuries  had  intervened  between 
them.  In  his  Latin,  with  which  we  are  more  particularly  concerned,  the 
mediaevalism  that  characterized  Dante's  style  has  almost  disappeared.  He  stands 
in  avowed  antagonism  to  scholasticism  and  the  clerical  school  in  literature.  He 
is  a  full-fledged  humanist,  with  a  humanist' s  attitude  toward  secular  letters,  classi- 
cal literature,  literary  immortality ;  with  the  emphasized  subjectivity,  the  keen 
consciousness  of  self,  and  much  of  the  pride  and  confidence  and  joy  in  living  that 
marked  the  reaction  from  the  standards  and  ideals  of  the  cloister.  Petrarch's  at- 
titude toward  religion  itself  is  humanistic.  He  steps  back  over  all  the  mediaeval 
myths  and  miracles,  the  lives  of  the  Saints  and  the  scholastic  subtleties,  and  draws 
his  system  of  faith  from  the  early  Fathers.  Augustine  was  his  spiritual  guide, 
and  in  the  Confessions  of  that  writer  he  found  the  inspiration  and  encouragement 
that  the  religious  side  of  his  nature  demanded.  The  latter  is  the  principal  inter- 
locutor in  three  dialogues  De  Contemptu  Mundi — a  gentle,  reverent,  but  conscien- 
tiously exacting  character,  rather  better  read  in  the  profane  poets  than  in  the  Bible. 

The  genesis  of  Renaissance  Latin  literature  is  illustrated  in  the  literary  evolu- 
tion of  Petrarch  himself.  Like  it,  he  drew  his  first  inspiration  from  the  vulgar 
tongue  and  expressed  himself  in  romantic  rhyme  before  he  did  in  Latin.  Pos- 
terity has  exactly  reversed  the  judgment  he  himself  pronounced  upon  his  works, 
and  has  remembered  him  for  what  he  disregarded  and  forgotten  the  more  preten- 
tious works  upon  which  he  based  his  hopes  of  fame.  Boccaccio,  his  friend  and 
contemporary,  has  had  a  similar  experience.  His  tales,  which  are  still  read — 
sometimes  with  the  added  savor  of  stolen  sweets — antedate  the  rather  commonplace 
Latin  works  which  he  modestly  hoped  would  win  him  the  esteem  of  future  gener. 
ations.  But  Petrarch's  Latin  writings  really  deserve  more  than  the  consideration 
that  idle  curiosity  bestows  ;  for,  aside  from  their  biographical  interest,  they  possess 
many  of  the  elements  of  true  literature. 

Petrarch's  Latin  is  by  no  means  perfect.  Like  himself,  it  is  not  entirely  free 
from  the  effects  of  mediaeval  influences.  But  he  uses  it  with  freedom  and  facility, 
and  the  best  possible  proof  of  the  advance  that  he  had  made  in  purity  of  diction  is 
found  in  the  fact  that  his  life  of  Caesar,  through  a  strange  oversight  on  the  part  of 
scholars,  was  supposed  for  a  long  time  to  be  a  work  of  Julius  Celsus,  an  apocryphal 
contemporary  of  Caesar  himself.*     Thirty-four  lines  of  the  Africa  were  alsopub- 

*  There  is  so  much  internal  evidence  that  would  place  the  authorship  of  this  book  at  a  later 
date  that  it  seems  incredible  that  it  should  ever  have  been  mistaken  for  a  work  of  the  Roman 
period.  Graevius,  in  his  edition  of  1697,  call  attention  to  some  of  these  points,  an  allusion  to  Sue-. 
tonius,  another  to  Augustine,  the  mention  of  the  Flandri  and  of  the  Caesares  of  Germany- 
Lemaire,  in  his  edition  of  1820,  following  Bernard  de  la  Monnaye,  suggested  Petrarch  as  the 
author,  but  left  the  final  proof  to  Schneider,  who  definitely  settled  the  question  in  his  edition,  pub- 
lished at  Leipsic  seven  years  later.  Lemaire  mentions  as  a  reason  for  publication,  besides  the 
celebrity  of  the  work,  aliquam  styli  incunditatem. 


LATIN    OF    THE    RENAISSANCE.  67 

lished  in  1 781,  by  a  French  scholar,  as  a  fragment  of  the  Punica  of  Silius  Italicus. 
While  scientific  criticism  was  not  so  far  advanced  in  the  eighteenth  century  as  it 
is  at  present,  the  possibility  of  such  errors  on  the  part  of  men  as  well  read  in 
classical  literature  as  we  are  to-day,  speaks  most  emphatically  for  the  great  im- 
provement that  Petrarch  had  made  in  the  literary  language.  He  was  the  founder 
not  only  of  New  Latin  prose,  but  indirectly,  through  this,  of  Italian  prose  as  well. 
Nor  was  his  Latin  a  mere  patchwork  of  classical  centos  and  allusions.  So  great 
was  his  love  of  individuality  of  expression  that  even  in  compilations  he  seems 
purposely  to  have  avoided  so  far  as  possible  using  the  words  of  the  author  whom 
he  cites.* 

An  exhaustive  classification  of  Petrarch's  Latin  works  is  given  in  the  first  vol- 
ume of  Korting's  Geschichte  der  Literatur  Italiens.  Omitting  the  polemic 
works,  which  are  unimportant  from  a  literary  point  of  view,  the  rather  stilted  ora- 
tions, and  those  fragmentary  and  for  the  most  part  uninteresting  literary  remains 
that  are  valuable  principally  for  their  biographical  data  or  as  giving  completeness  to 
his  writings,  there  remain  a  number  of  works  that  are  both  important  and  interest- 
ing, and  on  account  of  their  intrinsic  merit  as  well  as  their  subsequent  influence  are 
to  be  regarded  as  true  literary  monuments.  But  we  shall  adopt  a  rather  different 
classification  from  that  of  Korting,  as  better  fitted  to  illustrate  the  peculiar  aspect 
of  Petrarch' s  position  in  the  history  of  Latin  literature  which  it  is  our  purpose  to 
bring  out. 

Classical  Latin  had  the  function  of  reproducing  and  expressing  all  the  various 
phenomena  and  interests  and  thoughts  and  feelings  of  ancient  life.  For  that 
reason  it  was  multiform,  shaping  itself  with  protoplasmic  adaptability  to  all  the 
various  demands  made  upon  it  as  the  living  language  of  an  entire  people.  During 
the  Middle  Ages  its  field  was  narrowed  down  practically  to  the  expression  of  a 
single  class  of  conceptions  ;  it  was  specialized  along  the  theological  and  formu- 
listic  side,  ands  uffered  a  corresponding  atrophy  of  all  its  other  parts.  During  the 
Renaissance  an  effort  was  made  to  revive  what  had  been  lost.  But  this  revival 
was  and  could  be  only  partial.  Much  of  ancient  Latin  had  disappeared  forever. 
Still,  the  Renaissance  Latinist  did  not  feel  the  limitations  that  this  fact  imposed 
upon  his  literary  medium.  He  lived  in  an  ideal  world,  an  ancient  Rome  revived, 
or  his  conception  of  ancient  Rome  as  conveyed  to  him  by  classical  literature. 
Though  this  conception  was  reasonably  complete,  it  did  not  take  him  beyond  the 
limits  which  Latin,  as  he  knew  it,  covered.  His  correspondents  were  Ciceros  and 
Horaces,  his  patron  a  Maecenas,  his  city  an  urbs,  her  train  bands  legions,  their 
captains  tribunes  and  legates.  He  played  at  being  a  Roman  all  his  life.  This 
was  all  serious  and  earnest  with  him,  and  what  was  more  important,  with  his  con- 
temporaries.    He  was  more  than  a  simple  Uncle  Toby,  because  all   his  neighbors 

*  This  is  well  illustrated  by  the  following  instance  from  the  Libri  Rerutn  Memorabilium, 
given  by  Baiimker,  o.  c,  page  2,  where  they  are  used,  however,  for  different  purpose  :  (a)  De 
Platone,  quod  Sallustius  ait  de  Carthagine,  melius  erat  tacere  quam  parum  loqui,  where  the 
reference  is  to  Jugurtha,  19,  2 ;  Nam  de  Carthagine  silere  melius  puto  quam  parunt  dicere 
(b)  Habuit  et praeceptores  alios,  Dionysium  inpritnis  scripturarutn  rudimentis,  Aristonent 
Argivum  in  palaestra,  in  qua  exercitatissinius  evasit,  where  the  citation  is  from  Apuleius,  de 
Dogmate  Platonis,  1.  i,  2 ;  Doctores  habuit  in  prima  literatura  Dionysium  ;  et  in  palaestra 
Aristonem  Argis  oriunduin,  tantosque  progressus  exercitatio  ei  contulit,  ut  Pythia  et  Isth' 
ntia  de  luctatu  certaverit. 


68  MEDIEVAL   AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY.  , 

were  Uncle  Tobies,  too.  Such  a  culture  and  such  a  Latin  had  nothing  in  common 
with  the  mediaeval  culture  and  Latin  that  had  immediately  preceded  it.  There 
has  been  a  reversion  in  type  to  a  remote  ancestor. 

The  time  came,  however,  when  this  idealistic  Renaissance  culture  found  itself 
involuntarily  drawn  into  the  very  vortex  of  modern  life.  With  the  opening  of  the 
Reformation  its  school  days  were  over,  and  it  found  itself  wrestling  with  the 
serious  problems  of  human  existence.  Classical  training  and  culture  became  the 
shield  and  sword  of  theological  controversy.  At  one  end  of  this  period  stands 
Petrarch,  filled  with  enthusiasm  from  the  new  learning,  with  pagan  ideals  and 
love  of  ancient  Rome,  but  casting  half  conscience  stricken  glances  ever  and  anon 
at  the  mediaevialism  that  he  was  leaving.  At  the  other  end  stands  Erasmus, 
regretfully  abandoning  the  groves  of  learning  for  the  theological  arena,  and  sor- 
rowfully exchanging  the  toga  for  the  sagulum.  Between  these  two  were  several 
generations  of  scholars  who  were  with  heart  and  soul,  with  undivided  interest  and 
attention  given  to  the  study  and  the  expression  of  ancient  literary  ideals.  They 
restored  Latin  to  classical  purity  and  to  something  like  universal  application  for 
higher  literary  purposes.  With  Erasmus  and  Melancthon  the  Latin  ceased  to  be 
the  main  thing ;  it  became  subservient  to  the  thought.  It  is  the  subtile  influence 
of  the  content  that  makes  the  Latin  of  the  Reformation  different  from  that  of  the 
Renaissance. 

It  is  possibly  due  to  the  fact  that  they  are  placed  at  transition  periods  that 
Petrarch  and  Erasmus  were  able  to  infuse  into  their  Latin  something  of  the  vital 
plasticity  of  the  vernacular.  The  pleasure  one  takes  in  their  style  goes  deeper 
than  the  intellect ;  there  is  an  element  in  it  that  transcends  mere  formal  correct- 
ness ;  though  observing  form,  it  is  not  dominated  by  it. 

From  a  purely  linguistic  standpoint  Petrarch's  Latin  works  are  practically  uni- 
form. They  are  all  thoroughly  imbued  with  the  humanistic  spirit.  But  some 
look  toward  the  Middle  ages,  some  toward  ancient  Rome.  The  representative 
works  of  the  former  class  are  dialogues  :  De  Conte77iptu  Mundi;  De  Remediis 
Utriusque  Fortunae,  mediaeval  in  form  and  conception  at  least ;  De  Vita  Soli- 
taria  ;  and  De  Otio  Religiosorum.  The  works  which  are  inspired  entirely  by  the 
classical  or  Renaissance  spirit  are  the  Rerum  Memorandarum  Libri  :  De  Viris 
Illustribus  Vitae,  of  which  there  is  also  an  epitome  by  Petrarch  ;  most  of  his 
letters,  and  the  Latin  poems — the  epic  Africa,  the  Eclogues,  and  the  Epistles. 

The  dialogue  De  Conte??tptu  Mundi  is  the  most  important  of  those  works  which 
are,  in  a  sense,  farewell  words  to  the  Middle  Ages.  Theoretically  Petrarch  still 
professed  to  believe  in  the  mediaeval  ideal  of  life  as  something  to  be  devoted  solely 
and  entirely  to  a  preparation  for  the  world  to  come.  When  this  conception  was 
carried  out  to  its  ultimate  consequences  with  the  relentless  logic  of  the  schoolmen, 
and  by  a  mind  tinctured  with  mediaeval  ideals,  it  led  to  a  theory  of  living  wholly 
antagonistic  to  humanism.  The  dialogue  is  a  defense  of  this  one  phase  of 
scholasticism;  but  it  is  the  scholasticism  of  the  heart,  not  that  of  the  head,  that 
appeals  to  Petrarch.  We  can  premise  also  that,  whatever  the  theoretical  conclu- 
sions of  the  work,  monkish  self-abnegation  and  intellectual  as  well  as  physical  as- 
ceticism had  probably  as  little  practical  influence  upon  Petrarch's  life  as  it  has  on 


ours.* 


*  Cook. 


LATIN    OF    THE    RENAISSANCE.  69 

The  dialogue  opens  with  an  account  of  Veritas,  who  appears  to  Petrarch  when 
he  is  in  doubt  and  perplexity  as  to  the  meaning  of  the  obligations  of  life,  much  as 
Philosophia  did  to  Boethius  :  Attonito  tnihi  qui'dem,  et  saepissime  cogitanti,  quali- 
ter  in  hanc  vitam.  intrassem,  qiialiterve  forem  egressurus,  contigit  nuper  ut,  non 
sicui  aegros  animos  solei  somnus  oppriniere,  sed  anxiiim  atque  pervigilemy  mulier 
quaedem  innarabilis  claritatis  et  luminis,  formaqiie  non  satis  ab  hominibus  intel- 
lecta — incertum  qtiibis  viis  adisse  videretur,  virginem,  tamen  et  habitus  nunciabat 
et  fades — me  stupentem  insuetae  lucis  aspectu  et  adversus  radios  quos  octiloruvi 
eiiis  sol  fundebat  non  audentem  oculos  ottollere,  sic  loqueretur.  After  a  brief  con- 
versation she  introduces  to  him  Augustine  as  his  spiritual  guide,  who  is  to  relieve 
him  from  his  perplexities  and  explain  away  his  doubts.  The  three  days'  conver- 
sation'with  Augustine  is  given  in  the  three  books  of  the  dialogue. 

The  proposition,  '*  ad  contemnendas  huius  vitae  illecebras  componendumqtie  inter 
tot  mundi procellas  animum  nihil  efficacius  reperiri  quam  memoj'iam  propriae  mis- 
eriae  et  meditationejn  mortis  assiduam,  forms  the  key  note  to  Augustine' s  argument. 
Next  to  this  meditationem  mortis  humanaeque  miseriae  comes  desederium  vehemens 
sttidiimique  surgendi  as  a  means  to  salvation.  That  these  two  principles  are  consist- 
ently supported  throughout  is  the  important  thing  about  this  book.  We  do  not  find 
such  religious  seriousness  in  Poggio  or  Valla  or  Politian  ;  nor  do  these  men  appear 
to  have  had  spiritual  experiences  like  Plutarch's.  Partly,  no  doubt,  this  was  be- 
cause the  men  themselves  were  different.  But  this  was  not  all.  Beneath  all  the 
dialectics  and  speculation  of  the  Middle  Ages  there  ran  in  nobler  minds  a  strong 
current  of  faith  and  spiritual  experience  which  was  quite  foreign  to  the  Renais- 
sance. Petrarch  had  had  this  experience,  but  in  him  enlightenment  had  trans- 
formed what  might  have  been  a  fog  of  superstition  in  another  person  and  in  a 
darker  age  into  an  ethereal  haze  of  mysticism.  His  poetical  imagination  idealized 
his  self-communion  into  a  spiritual  relationship  between  himself  and  his  father  con- 
fessor, Augustine,  analogous  to  the  equally  ideal  romantic  relationship  existing 
between  himself  and  Laura. 

But  while  the  spirit  of  the  book  may  be  partly  mediaeval,  Petrarch  does  not  fail 
to  aim  a  shaft  at  scholasticism,  *^  Dialectorum  garrulitas,  nulhim  finetn  habitura. 
He  erroneously  attributes  to  Cicero  a  passage  from  the  first  epistle  of  Seneca,  per- 
haps the  only  instance  of  such  an  error  in  his  works.     In  the  second  dialogue 
there  is  a  rather  fine  description  of  Petrarch's  life  at  Vaucluse  : 

Meministi  quatita  cum  voluptate  reposto  quondam  rure  vagabaris,  et  nunc  her- 
bosis  pratorum  toris  accumbans,  murmur  aquae  luctantis  hatcriebas  ;  nunc  apertis 
collibus  residensy  subiectam  planitiem  libero  metiebaris  intuitu ;  nunc  in  apricae 
vallis  umbraculo,  dulci  sopore  correptus^  optato  silentio  fruebaris  ;  nunquam  otiosus 
mente,  aliquid  altum  semper  agitans,  et  solis  Musis  comitantibus  nusquam  soluSy 
denique  Vergiliani  senis  example ^ — 

Qui  regem  aequabat  opes  animo,  seraque  revertens 
Node  domum  dapibus  mensas  onerabat  inemptas  ; 

sub  occasum  solis  angustam  domum  repetens,  et  tuis  contentus  bonis,  numquid  non 
tibi  omnium  mortalium  longe  ditissimus  et  plane  felicissimus  videbaris  ? 

For  Augustine,  who  here  represents  the  ideals  of  mediaeval  asceticism,  literary 
pursuits  are  but  inatiis  gloriae  lenocinium,  and  to  Petrarch,  still  reluctant  to  sacri- 


70  MEDIAEVAL    AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

fice  them,  even  for  his  soul's  sake,  he  says  :  Quo  pede  claudices  agnosco.  Te  ip- 
sum  derelinquere  mavis  quam  libellos  tuos. — A  bice  ingentes  histoi'iarum  sarcinas^ 
satis  Romanae  res  gestae,  et  suapte  fama  et  aliorum  ingeniis  lustratae  sunt. 
Dimitte  Africam,  eamque  possessoribus  suis  linque,  Nee  Scipioni  tuo  nee  tibi 
gloriam  cumulabis ;  ille  altius  nequit  extolH,  tu  post  euni  obliquo  calle  niteris. 
His  igitur  posthabitis,  te  tandem  tibi  restitue.  Incipe  tecum  de  morte  cogitare^ 
cui  sensim  et  nescius  appropinquas. 

Petrarch  continued  his  studies  and  literary  labors  with  undiminished  ardor, 
however,  after  the  publication  of  this  work.  Asceticism  was  a  theory  with  him, 
not  a  practice. 

De  Re?nediis  Utriusque  Fortunae  shows  mediaeval  influence  in  its  form  more 
than  in  its  content.  The  work  is  in  two  books,  as  its  title  suggests,  and  consists 
of  over  two  hundred  and  fifty  dialogues.  The  characters  are  allegorical,  like 
those  of  the  morality  plays  or  the  Middle  Age  theological  dialogues,  and  the 
work  is  utterly  devoid  of  any  suggestion  of  dramatic  variety  and  expression.  In 
the  first  book  Ratio,  the  principal  interlocutor,  tempers  the  undue  elation  of 
Gaudium  and  Spes  with  wise  reflections  upon  the  uncertainty  of  fortune  and  the 
evils  attending  prosperity ;  in  the  second  she  comforts  Dolor  with  rather  conven- 
tional commonplaces  upon  the  lessons  to  be  learned  from  adversity  and  the  com- 
pensations that  accompany  misfortunes.  There  is  a  sort  of  a  well  worn,  locus 
classicus  atmosphere  about  the  ethics  and  philosophy  of  the  work  that  reminds  one 
a  little  of  Pope,  though,  of  course,  in  form  and  finish  it  falls  far  below  anything 
that  the  latter  writer  ever  published.  The  burden  of  conversation  falls  upon 
Ratio,  the  part  of  the  other  characters  being  confined  in  most  cases  to  a  repetition 
in  more  or  less  varying  form  of  the  statement  that  forms  the  theme  of  the  dialogue. 
Though  the  method  of  treatment  is  monotonous  in  the  extreme,  there  is  the 
utmost  variety  of  subject.  Ratio  is  called  upon  to  temper  the  self- congratulation 
of  Gaudium  over  fast  horses,  success  at  play,  the  possession  of  fish  ponds,  a 
beautiful  wife,  noble  birth,  many  books,  wealth,  glory,  power,  literary  fame,  on 
the  one  hand,  while  she  consoles  Dolor  for  poverty,  illness,  domestic  calamity  or 
infelicity,  exile,  or  the  toothache  on  the  other.  In  fact,  like  some  country  stores, 
the  work  might  be  called  a  universal  emporium,  intended  to  supply  all  the  needs 
that  practical,  every  day  life  could  make  upon  it.  So  catholic  was  the  character 
of  its  philosophy  that  it  was  supposed  to  afford  solace  even  in  such  humble  mal- 
adies as  the  rheumatism  and  the  colic,  if  we  may  so  translate  dolor  iliacus.  Per- 
haps Petrarch's  feud  with  the  physicians  accounts  in  part  for  this. 

Besides  its  form,  there  is  also  an  occasional  tincture  of  mediaevalism  in  the 
very  matter  of  the  book  itself.  When  this  monkish  attitude  appears,  there  is  an 
inconsistent  exaggeration  about  it,  as  if  the  author  had  suddenly  bethought  him- 
self of  the  seemliness  of  being  pious,  and  was  making  up  for  past  neglect.  To  us, 
and  probably  to  the  humanists  as  well,  there  would  appear  to  be  a  touch  of  affec- 
tation and  cant  in  such  passages  as  the  following  : 

Gaudium. — Cantu  delector  ac  fidibus. 

Ratio, — Ah  quanto  melius  lacrimis  atque  suspiriis  !  Praestat  enim  Jlendo  ad 
gaudium,  quam  gaudendo  ad gemitui7i  pervenire. 

But  Petrarch  forgets  himself  a  moment  later  in  a  string  of  classical  anecdotes 
touching  upon  music,  from  his  index  rerum  :  Arion,  Themistocles,  Epanimondas, 


LATIN    OF   THE    RENAISSANCE.  7 1 

Alcibiades  and  Nero  are  brought  upon  the  stage  before  he  recollects  himself 
and  closes  with  :  O  si  audires  sanctorum  suspira  !  O  si  hinc  aures  tuas  damna- 
torum  gemitus  et  la7nenta  percellerent !  Hinc  beatorutn  iubilus^  et  cantus  angelici, 
atque  ilia  caelestis  harmonia,  quafn  Pythagoras  ponity  Aristoteles  evertit,  Cicero 
instaurat,  etc. 

De  Otio  Religiosorum  is  a  work  addressed  to  the  monks  of  Montrieu,  where 
Petrarch  had  been  entertained  when  upon  a  visit  to  his  brother,  who  had  entered 
the  Carthusian  order.  The  words  of  the  Psalm,  Vacate  et  Videtey*  form  the  text 
of  what  is  really  a  eulogy  of  monastic  life  as  Petrarch  conceived  it,  a  life  of  ease 
and  retirement  devoted  to  religious  meditation.  The  inmate  of  the  cloister  is 
happier  than  the  sailor,  the  soldier,  the  merchant,  the  husbandman,  the  craftsman, 
or  even  the  student :  N'oJt  praecipitur  ut  pugnetisy  ut  navigetis,  ut  aretis,  ut  am- 
biatiSf  ut  congregetis  atiruniy  famam,  litter  as  inanes — instrumenta  libidinuniy 
nocittira,  pestifera  sunt  haec.  This  is  all  more  or  less  sincere.  It  is  probable  that 
Petrarch,  however  actual  experience  might  have  changed  his  views  upon  the  subject, 
often  seriously  fancied  a  monastic  life.  Vaucluse  itself  was  a  sort  of  a  hermitage, 
He  once  proposed  to  a  number  of  friends  to  found  for  themselves  a  humanistic 
cloister  in  some  Italian  city,  where  the  Muses  could  be  cultivated  undisturbed  by 
the  constant  religious  and  political  turmoil  that  distracted  Italy,  f  A  tragedy  that 
itself  illustrated  the  lawlessness  of  the  times  put  an  end  to  these  plans. ;{:  But  they 
show  what  a  strong  hold  mediaeval  ideals  still  had  on  Petrarch's  mind.  The 
vagrant,  anti- cloistral  spirit  that  we  have  seen  anticipated  in  the  Goliards,  was  one 
of  the  characteristics  of  the  humanists.  We  see  how  strong  the  itinerant  instinct 
was  in  Petrarch  himself,  and  in  Erasmus  ;  but  to  both  these  men  the  reaction,  the 
desire  for  tranquil  retirement  often  came.  Petrarch  did  not  know  that  he  was 
drawing  the  curtain  of  a  new  era.  Though  he  appreciated  fully  his  own  impor- 
tance in  the  contemporary  world,  and  hoped  that  posterity  would  continue  to  recog- 
nize it,  he  was  not  conscious  of  his  position  in  the  history  of  European  culture,  of 
the  fact  that  in  him  were  focussed  enough  of  those  rays  of  ancient  thought  that  had 
pierced  the  mediaeval  darkness  to  kindle  again  the  fires  of  learning.  He  never 
saw  the  Petrarch  that  we  see,  and  the  responsibility  of  his  position  as  the  great 
protagos  of  humanism  was  not  impressed  upon  him.  He  was  not  a  partisan,  be- 
cause the  fission  of  the  old  from  the  new  was  taking  place  in  his  own  being  ;  part 
of  him  was  ever  yearning  to  return  to  the  mother  organism  of  mediaeval  culture, 
part  was  striving  continually  to  free  itself  from  the  limitations  which  that  culture 
imposed.  The  continuity  of  history  was  not  broken.  For  that  reason,  Petrarch 
neither  drew  the  sharp  line  between  pagan  and  Christian  writers  that  the  orthodox 
scholars  of  the  Middle  Ages  had  drawn,  nor  did  he  yield  entire  homage  to  the 
authors  of  antiquity  like  those  who  came  after  him.  Cicero  and  Augustine  stand 
upon  the  same  pedestal.  In  the  work  just  mentioned  Petrarch  cites,  besides  the 
great  orator,  Vergil  and  Juvenal,  the  younger  Pliny,  Varro,  and  Horace,  drawing 
from  all  arguments  in  favor  of  a  monastic  life.     In  De  Vita  Solitaria  a  long  list  of 

♦Vulgate,  Psalms,  45,  11. 

t  Cf.  Ep.  Fam.,  VIII.,  4  and  5. 

X  Mainardo  Accursio,  an  intimate  friend  whom  Petrarch  wished  to  associate  with  him  in  this 
undertaking,  was  killed  by  bandits  while  journeying  through  the  Appenines.  A  few  years  later, 
during  his  absence  however,  Petrarch's  house  at  Vaucluse  was  plundered  and  burned  by  robbers. 


/ 


72  MEDIEVAL   AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

pagans,  from  Romulus  and  Numa  to  the  emperors,  are  cited  along  with  the  early 
saints  and  fathers  of  the  church  among  those  who  have  preferred  retirement  and 
private  meditation  to  the  companionship  of  their  fellow  men. 

But  solitude  does  not  mean  with  Petrarch  the  listless,  indolent  solitude,  the 
purely  sensual  solitude  of  the  illiterate  monk  or  hermit,  who  exists  through  a  life 
of  intellectual  lethargy,  confined  within  the  little  circle  of  his  own  narrow  personal 
experience  or  his  morbid  imagination.  Solitude  is  communion  with  the  great 
without  the  distraction  of  physical  companionship.  Like  all  good  things  it  be- 
comes the  worst  of  things  when  perverted.  Books,  letters,  lofty  thinking,  are  the 
food  that  make  it  a  condition  for  mental  or  moral  growth ;  it  must  be  active,  as 
well  as  passive,  productive  as  well  as  receptive. 

This  distinction  occurs  frequently  in  Petrarch's  writings.  It  forms  the  open- 
ing paragraph  of  the  Rerum  Memorandarum  Libri.  Again,  in  the  Vita  Soli- 
taria  ;  Solitudo  sine  litteris  exilium  est,  career  ; — adhibite  litteras,  patria  est^  liber- 
tas,  delectatio.  '  Oiium  sine  litteris  mors  est,  et  vera  sepultura.^  This  was  not 
the  ideal  of  Benedict  or  Bernard.  The  humanist  shares  with  the  monk  even  this 
part  of  Petrarch's  nature. 

Finally,  Petrarch's  attitude  toward  women  is  rendered  contradictory  by  the 
strong  hold  that  mediaeval  ideals  had  taken  upon  his  soul.  He  was  by  nature  a 
lyricist,  a  poet  of  emotion,  an  idealizer  of  women.  We  involuntarily  mention  Pe- 
trarch and  Laura  in  the  same  breath.  Yet  he  wrote,  not  once,  but  often,  such 
passages  as  the  following  : 

Adampublicus  ille  parens  generis  humani,  quamdiu  solus  fuit  nemo  felicior, 
jnox  ut  comitatus  nemo  miserior ;  solus  stetit,  comitatus  ruit ;  solus  beatae  civis 
patriae,  comitatus  infelicis  exilii  peregrinus  ;  solus  in  requie  et  gaudio,  comitatus 
in  laboribus  et  doloribus  multis.  Denique  solus  htimortalis  fuerat  ;  iunge  sociam, 
mortalis  ejfficitur.  lam  hinc  clarum,  et  insigne  praesagium  quid  de  societate 
femitiea  sperarc  posteritas  deberet.  And  again  he  says  :  Nullum  viris  adeo  pesti- 
ferum  ut  muliebre  consortium.  R  ii^o  sub  eodem  tecto  habitant  quies  et  mulier.  Of 
course  Seneca  was  responsible  for  some  of  Petrarch's  views  regarding  solitude  and 
the  society  of  women  ;  but  from  whatever  source  he  derived  his  opinions,  his  atti- 
tude toward  society  and  the  world  in  general  was  in  very  many  respects  monkish. 
The  two  great  champions  of  mediaevalism  were  the  monks  and  the  schoolmen. 
Against  the  latter  only  did  Petrarch  direct  his  attacks.  The  former  were  reserved 
for  a  later  generation  of  humanists. 

As  a  rule  the  letters  of  a  New  Latin  writer  are  his  most  interesting  productions. 
Not  only  was  epistolography  an  art  cultivated  with  great  care  by  the  humanists, 
but  with  them  letters  took  the  place,  to  a  great  extent,  of  modern  periodical  litera- 
ture. The  volume  of  correspondence  at  this  period  was  proportionately  large. 
What  was  written  was  written  for  publication,  with  the  finish  and  care  that  was  to 
be  expected  in  writings  that  were  to  be  subjected  to  the  scrutinizing  criticism,  not 
only  of  contemporary  scholars  but  of  posterity  as  well.  Petrarch,  after  destroying 
perhaps  the  major  part  of  the  copies  of  letters  in  his  possession — mille  vel  eo  am- 
plius — edited  his  familiar  epistles  in  twenty-four  books.  A  later  collection,  the 
letters  of  his  old  age,  contained  seventeen  books.  Besides  these  we  have  a  col- 
lection of  miscellaneous  letters,  and  an  Epistolarum  sine  Titulo  Liber,  which  con- 
tains correspondence  dealing  with  ecclesiastical  matters. 


LATIN    OF   THE    RENAISSANCE.  73 

Some  of  these  letters  are  really  essays.  One  contains  a  commentary  upon  his 
Dialogues  ;  *  another,!  Z><r  Republica  Optime  Administranda,  is  a  short  political 
tractate  ;  another  gives  a  Latin  version  of  the  tale  of  Griselda,  which  is  found  in 
Boccaccio.J  In  the  twenty-four  books  of  the  Epistolae  de  Rebus  Fantiliaribus 
are  a  number  of  letters  Ad  viros  illustres  veteres,  which  suggest  in  their  concep- 
tion, though  rather  remotely  perhaps,  Landor's  Imaginary  Conversations.  The 
third  epistle  of  this  book,  in  which  he  reproves  Cicero  for  those  weaknesses  in  the 
character  of  the  great  orator  learned  through  the  letters  to  Atticus,  Brutus,  and 
Quintus,  recently  discovered  in  the  cathedral  library  at  Verona,  is  interesting  as 
showing  a  moral  independence  on  the  part  of  Petrarch  that  was  not  shaken  by  his 
admiration  of  Cicero  as  a  writer. 

No  single  letter  is  more  intrinsically  interesting  in  its  contents,  or  affords  a 
better  example  of  the  genial  grace  of  style  and  treatment  that  was  characteristic  of 
Petrarch  in  this  sphere  of  writing,  than  the  account  of  the  ascent  of  Mont  Venteux, 
in  the  fourth  book  of  the  Familiares.  This  is  not  only  an  important  contribution  to 
Petrarch's  psychic  biography,  as  recording  a  portion  of  the  soul  travail  that  at- 
tended the  birth  of  modern  conceptions  and  ideals  and  criteria  of  conscience  in 
him  ;  but  it  also  is  perhaps  the  first  instance  in  Latin  literature  of  a  spiritual  ex- 
perience called  forth  expressly  by  a  sublime  natural  environment.  §  In  fact,  Pe- 
trach  can  think  of  but  one  precedent  for  ascending  a  mountain  at  all,  and  that  a 
dubious  one  from  Pliny,  from  which  he  gained  courage,  however,  in  carrying  out 
what  seems  to  have  been  an  original  suggestion.  With  his  younger  brother  for  a 
companion  he  sallies  forth  statuta  die,  and  arrives  at  the  northern  base  of  the 
mountain  about  evening.  Jllic  unum  diem  morati,  hodie  tandem  cum  singulis 
famulis  montem  ascendimus,  non  sine  multa  dijfficultatate .  Est  enim  praerupta  et 
paene  inaccessibilis  saxosae  telluris  moles.     Sed  bene  a  poeta  dictum  est ; 

Labor  omnia  vincit  improbus 

Dies  longa,  blandus  aer,  animorum,  vigor,  corporum  robur  ac  dexteritas,  et  si  qua 
sunt  eiusmodi,  euntibus  aderant.  Sola  nobis  obstat  natura  loci.  They  come  upon 
an  aged  shepherd  in  the  lower  valley  who  tries  to  dissuade  them  from  their  attempt. 
He  had  made  the  ascent  fifty  years  before,  and  seems  to  have  brought  back  noth- 
ing from  his  experience  but  a  vivid  recollection  of  body  and  clothing  torn  by  the 
rocks  and  briars.  Their  youthful  ardor,  however^  is  only  fired  by  the  difficulties. 
Leaving  their  unnecessary  baggage  with  the  old  peasant,  they  begin  the  ascent 
with  the  eagerness  of  tiros.  There  is  something  quite  modern  in  their  experience, 
— alacresque  conscendimus.  Sed,  ut  fere  fit, — ingentem  conatum  velox  fatigatio 
subsequitur.  Non  procul  inde  igitur  quadem  in  rupe  subsistimus.  Inde  iterum 
digressi  provehimtir ,  sed  lentius,  et  praeserti?n  ego  montanum  iter  gressu  iam  modes- 
tiore  carpebam.  Petrarch  himself  manifests  a  decided  preference  for  long  about, 
gentle  ascents,  which  generally  end  by  bringing  him  no  nearer  to  the  summit  than 
he  was  at  first ;  while  his  younger  brother,  with  boyish  agility,  braves  the  difficult 

*  Ep.  Fan.,  X.,  4. 
fEp.  Sen..XIV..  I. 

X  Petrarch  thought  he  was  doing  his  friend  a  great  favor  in  thus  immortalizing  his  tale.  Cf. 
Ep.Sen.,y^y\\.,Z. 

g  Perhaps  we  should  except  again  St.  Bernard. 


74  MEDIEVAL    AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

places  at  once  and  has  the  satisfaction  of  laughing  at  the  baffled  poet  from  some 
higher  eminence.  At  length  they  come  to  the  final  ascent.  Collis  est  omnium 
supremtis,  quam  silvestres  filiolum  vacant^  cur  ignoro  ;  nisi  quod  per  antipkrasim, 
ut  quaedam  alia  did  suspicor.  Videtur  enim  vere  pater  omnium  vicinorum  mon- 
tium.  Illius  in  veriice  planities  parva  est.  Illic  demufn  fessi  conquievimus. 
Primum  omnium  spiritu  quodam  aeris  insolito,  et  spectaculo  liberiore  permotus, 
stupenti  si?nilis  steti.  Respicio ;  nubes  erant  sub  pedibus.  lamque  mihi  minus 
incredibilis  facti  sunt  Athos  ei  Olympus,  dum  quod  de  illis  audieram  et  legerem  in 
minoris  famae  m.onte  conspicio.  Dirigo  dehinc  oculorum  radios  ad  partes  Italicas, 
quo  magis  indinat  animus.  Alpes  ipsae  rigentes  ac  nivosae,  per  quas  ferus  ille 
quondam  hostis  Romani  nominis  transivit,  aceto — si  famae  credimus — saxa  per- 
rumpens,  iuxta  mihi  visae  sunt,  cum  tam  magno  distent  intervallo.  The  place, 
the  sublimity  of  the  view  suggest  to  Petrarch  the  sublimity  of  life  itself,  and  his 
own  mental  and  spiritual  experience  during  the  ten  years  since  he  left  Bologna 
and  his  youthful  studies.  At  length  he  is  recalled  to  himself  by  the  advancing 
shadow  and  the  declining  sun.  Et  velut  expergefactus  verto  m.e  in  tei-gum  ad 
occidentem  respiciens.  Limes  ille  Gallarum  et  Hispaniae,  Pyrenaeus  vertex  inde 
non  cernitur ;  nullius  quern  sciam  obicis  interventu,  sed  sola  fragilitate  mortalis 
visus.  (We  must  remember  that  this  was  before  Columbus'  time. )  Lugdunensis 
autem  provinciae  mantes  ad  dextram,  ad  laevam  vero  Massiliae  fretum  et  quod 
Aquas  Mortuas  verberat  aliquot  dierum  spatia  distantia  praeclarissime  videbantur. 
Rhodanus  ipse  sub  oculis  nostris  erat. 

But  a  book  must  share  the  sway  of  natiu"e  with  Petrarch.  He  had 
brought  with  him  a  copy  of  Augustine's  Confessions,  a  sort  of  pocket  edition 
perexigui  voluminis,  sed  injinitae  dulcedinis.  Opening  it,  his  eyes,  by  chance, 
it  seems,  happen  to  fall  upon  the  passage  :  Et  eunt  homines  admirari  alta 
montium,  et  ingentes  Jluctus  maris,  et  latissimos  lapsus  Jlufuinum,  et  Oceani 
ambitum,  et  gyros  siderum,  et  relinquunt  se  ipsos.  The  ancient,  the  mediaeval 
man  had  spoken.  Iraius  mihimet  quod  nunc  etiam  terrestria  mirarer,  qui 
iam  pridem  ab  ipsis  gentium  philosophis  discere  debuissem,  nihil  praeter  ani- 
mum  esse  mirabile  in  me  ipsum  interiores  oculos  rejlexi;  et  ex  ilia  hora  non  fuit 
qui  me  loquentem  audiret,  donee  ad  ima  pervenimus. — Hos  inter  nudos  pectoris 
motus  sine  sensu  scrupulosi  tramitis  ad  illud  hospitiolum  rusticwti,  unde  ante  lucem 
mover  em,  profunda  node  remeavi ;  et  luna  pernox  gratum  obsequium  praestabat 
•  euntibus.  Interim  ergo,  dum  fa??iulos  apparandae  cenae  studium  exerceret,  solus 
ego  in  partem  domus  abditam  perrexi,  haec  tibi  raptitfi  ex  tempore  scripturus,  ne, 
si  distulissem,  pro  varietate  locorum  mutatis  forsan  affedibus,  scribendi  propositum 
deferveret. 

In  Petrarch's  time  historical  writing  could  mean  little  else  than  compilation, 
especially  when  the  theme  was  the  history  of  an  ancient  people.  Scientific  his- 
torical criticism  was  unknown.  Petrarch  did  not  have  sufficient  knowledge  of 
Greek  to  consult  authorities  in  that  language  ;  of  the  Latin  historians  known  to  us 
only  a  portion  were  attainable  by  him,  and  that  in  unindexed  and  corrupted  man- 
uscripts ;  he  had  neither  the  disposition  nor  the  training  to  enable  him  to  consult 
intelligently  such  original  documents  as  might  be  accessible — inscriptions,  ruins, 
works  of  art,  or  other  archaeological  remains.  These  latter  might  serve  as  a  source 
of  inspiration  to  him,  but  they  never  could  serve  as  a  source  of  instruction. 


LATIN    OF    THE    RENAISSANCE.  75 

However  Petrarch  did  a  great  service  to  the  contemporary  literary  world  in 
this  department  of  letters.  The  Books  of  Memorable  Things  and  Lives  of  Illus- 
trious Men  might  almost  be  said  to  have  founded  modem  European  pros*?.  The 
latter  work  was  the  more  important  of  the  two,  partly  because  it  supplied  a  real 
intellectual  need  at  the  time  it  was  written,  partly  because  Petrarch  put  part  of 
himself  into  his  biographies,  threw  in  personal  sympathies  and  sentiments  that  are 
sometimes  lacking  in  his  other  works,  but  give  a  touch  of  individuality  to  this  one 
that  raises  it  a  degree  above  the  later  compilations  of  the  Roman  period  as  a  piece 
of  literature,  despite  the  faultiness  of  the  language.  Petrarch  collected  and  com- 
pared with  such  critical  acumen  as  he  could  muster  all  the  notices  of  the  men 
whose  lives  formed  the  subject  of  his  work  that  antiquity  had  handed  down  to  him, 
and  he  embodied  them  in  the  best  prose  that  had  been  written  since  the  beginning 
of  the  barbarian  invasions.  But  his  literary  service  did  not  end  here.  The  lives 
of  these  illustrious  men  are  the  lives  of  Petrarch's  saints  ;  he  writes  them  with  in- 
spiration. His  mental  attitude  towards  the  work  and  toward  those  whom  he  de- 
scribes in  it  is  as  different  from  that  of  a  mere  compiler  as  his  Latin  is  different 
from  that  pale  photograph  of  classicism  that  we  get  in  the  Viri  Romae.  His 
purpose  was  nee  tamen  verba  transcribere,  sed  res  ipsai^  selecting  more  espe- 
cially those  things  which  ad  virtutes  vel  virtutum  contraria  trahi  possunt. 
The  lives  vary  in  length  from  a  few  pages  to  a  good-sized  volume,  like  that 
of  Caesar.  Of  the  thirty-one  biographies  only  two,  those  of  Alexander  and 
Hannibal,  have  to  do  with  other  than  Romans.  The  work  was  very  popular,  was 
epitomized  by  Petrarch  himself,  and  was  translated  into  Italian  by  Donato  degli 
Albazani,  one  of  Petrarch's  friends.  These  latter  two  facts  probably  help  to  ex- 
plain how  the  fuller  biography  of  Caesar  was  so  far  forgotten  in  its  Latin  form  as 
to  be  mistaken  for  a  work  of  Celsus. 

The  style  of  this  work,  which  represents  Petrarch's  best  prose,  can  be  illus- 
trated most  satisfactorily  perhaps  by  an  extract.  The  following  is  from  the  twenty- 
seventh  chapter  of  the  life  of  Caesar  : 

Ibi  cum  assidiiset,  coniurati  euni  sub  praetextti  obsequii  circumsistunt ;  cum 
Cimber  Tullius,  qui  primas  sibi  f acinar  is  paries  assumpserat,  accedens  nescio  quid 
poposcit.  Neganti  in  praesens  inque  aliud  tetnpus  rem  trahettti  ab  utroque  humero 
togam  manibus  arripit.  Exclamantem,  ^^  Ista  quidem  vis  est,^'*  Cassius  intra 
iugulum  vulnerat.  Caesar,  Cassii pugione  arrepio  brachioque  eius  traiecto,  dum 
assurgeret  alio  vulnereremoratus  est,  quodunum  ex  omnibus  letale  medici  dixerunt . 
Sed  ad  tinatn  vitafn  Jiniendam  tale  vulnus  unum  satis  est.  Turn  se  undique  ab 
omnibus  stricto  ferro petividens,  neque  soli  inter  tantos  et  inemii  quicquam  auxilii 
superesse  intellegens,  spiritum  recollegit,  ne  quid  indecorum  moriens  diceret  aut 
faceret ;  neque  omnino  aliquid  dixit,  nisi  quod  ad primum  vulnus  parumper  in- 
fremuit,  nulla  voce  tamen  emissa  ;  et  Marco  Bruto  in  se  irruenti  Graecum  fertur 
nescio  quid  breve  dixisse,  de  quo  Caesarem  ipsum  dicere  solitum  refert  Cicero 
epistolarum  ad  Atticum  libro  decimo  :  **  Magni  refert  quid  hie  velit ;  sed  quicquia 
volet,  valde  voht.''^  Et  ipse  quidem  in  extremo  toga  caput  obnubit,  laevaque  sinum 
vestimenti  ad  inferiores  corporis  partes  extendit,  quo  casus  esset  honestior.  Jta  ille, 
qui  tot  terras  primum,  post  in  urbe  Roma  terrarum  orbem  mira  felicitate  subegerat, 
una  hora  tribus  et  viginti  vulneribus  ad  terram  datus  occubuit,  inque  omnem 
terram  auditus  est  ruinae  fragor  ingentis. 


J  6  MEDIAEVAL    AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

The  Africa  was  Petrarch's  most  pretentious  work,  the  one  upon  which  he 
based  his  hopes  of  permanent  fame,  and  also  perhaps  the  one  in  which  he  most 
completely  failed.  According  to  ancient  ideals  the  heroic  epic  represented  the 
highest  possible  literary  achievement,  and  it  was  therefore  the  natural  goal  of 
Petrarch's  ambition  as  a  poet.  All  through  his  works  references  to  the  poem 
occur,  either  echoes  of  its  theme  and  episodes,  or  gossipy  allusions  to  his  progress 
in  its  composition.  The  absolute  faith  in  Petrarch  and  in  the  permanent  revival 
of  Latin  that  prevailed  among  the  first  generation  of  humanists  caused  many 
to  expect  a  work  that  was  to  rank  with  the  Iliad  and  the  Aeneid  among  the 
great,  immortal  masterpieces  of  literature.  But  long  before  Petrarch's  death  and 
the  publication  of  the  partially  completed  poem,  from  a  fragment  which  had  been 
made  known  to  them,  and  possibly,  too,  from  inspection  on  the  part  of  intimate 
friends,  the  better  judgment  of  the  Florentine  critics  led  them  to  revise  their  pre- 
conceived opinion  of  the  future  work,  and  to  appreciate  the  limitations  which  the 
genius  of  the  poet  at  least,  if  not  his  time  and  literary  tongue,  placed  upon  it. 
Petrarch  himself  probably  felt  conscious  of  these  limitations  so  far  as  they  con- 
cerned himself  alone.  But  it  is  doubtful  whether  he  ever  realized  the  universal 
impossibility  of  a  new  Latin  epic.  As  a  lyric  songster  he  was  hardly  capable  of 
the  lofty  and  sustained  flight  of  epic  verse,  and  as  a  result  the  Africa  is  a  sort  of 
a  flitting  from  tree  to  tree,  a  series  of  attractive,  interesting,  sometimes  emotional 
episodes,  which  seldom  rise  to  the  sublime. 

The  theme  of  the  Africa  is  the  story  of  the  elder  Africanus,  in  the  second 
Punic  war.  The  poem  opens,  after  an  invocation  to  the  Muses  and  a  dedication 
to  King  Robert  of  Sicily,  with  a  brief  review  of  the  wars  between  Carthage  and 
Rome  ;  Hasdrubal  has  just  been  summoned  to  Italy  by  Hannibal,  and  Scipio, 
now  master  of  Spain,  pauses  uncertain  where  next  to  turn  his  arms.  His  father 
appears  to  him  in  a  vision  and  discloses  what  the  fates  have  in  store  for  him  and 
his  country.  This  dream  occupies  the  remainder  of  the  first  and  all  of  the  second 
book.  The  third  and  a  portion  of  the  fourth  book  describe  the  embassy  of  Laelius 
at  the  court  of  Syphax,  closing  with  the  former's  eulogy  of  Scipio  at  a  banquet  in 
the  palace.  These  books  subserve  the  same  purpose  as  the  second  and  third  of 
the  Aeneid,  enabling  the  Roman  guest  to  relate  to  his  Numidian  host  the  former 
exploits  of  the  Romans  and  the  biography  of  the  hero  of  the  poem.  There  is  now 
a  lacuna  of  over  three  books,  constituting  the  unfinished  portion  of  the  poem,  and 
the  narrative  reopens  with  the  infatuation  of  Massinissa  for  Sophonisbe,  the  wife 
of  Syphax,  whom  he  has  just  captured  after  defeating  her  husband  in  battle.  He 
secretly  marries  his  beautiful  captive  ;  but  Scipio  demands  that  she  be  delivered  to 
the  Romans,  and  her  husband  in  despair  sends  her  poison.  The  sixth  book,  as  at 
present  numbered,  opens  with  the  appearance  of  Sophonisbe  in  the  lower  world — 
She  is  the  Dido  of  the  Africa,  but  perhaps  a  more  lovable,  winning  character  than 
the  Carthagenian  queen — where  she  becomes  the  companion  of  those  unfortunate  in 
love.  The  remainder  of  the  book  is  taken  up  with  the  triumph  of  Massinissa, 
Laelius'  return  to  Rome  with  the  Carthagenian  prisoners,  the  first  negotiations  for 
peace,  and  Hannibal's  return  to  Carthage.  It  closes  with  the  death  of  Mago- 
while  returning  from  Italy.  The  two  following  books  describe  the  subsequent  suc- 
cesses of  Scipio,  the  battle  of  Zama,  and  the  conclusion  of  peace.  The  last  book 
contains  an  account  of  the  return  of  Scipio  and  his  triumph,  the  last  fifty  lines  be- 


LATIN    OF   THE    RENAISSANCE.  77 

ing  devoted  to  a  lament  over  the  death  of  Robert,  and  a  rather  depressnig  admo- 
nition to  the  Muses  to  avoid  appearing  in  Italy  during  the  troublous  times  under 
which  she  was  laboring. 

Vergil  is  Petrarch's  master  in  the  construction  of  the  Africa,  very  much  in  the 
same  way  that  Homer  was  Vergil's  master  in  the  composition  of  the  Aeneid.  The 
character  of  the  influence  was  similar  though  the  result  was,  naturally,  different ; 
for  Vergil  was  writing  under  conditions  favorable  for  the  production  of  a  great 
poem,  Petrarch  was  not.  Though,  as  we  have  seen,  the  Italians  of  Petrarch's 
time  looked  upon  Roman  history  as  their  own,  and  the  Africa  was  written  in 
response  to  this  sentiment,  both  the  theme  and  the  language  were  too  remote  from 
the  life  of  the  people  to  make  the  poem  really  a  national  one.  Petrarch's  relation 
to  Vergil  is  indicated  by  parallel  incidents  and  parallel  modes  of  expression 
rather  than  by  the  actual  appropriation  of  verses  and  centos.  As  an  illustration 
of  the  first  :  Syphax,  king  of  Numidia,  receives  Scipio's  ambassador  Laelius, 
who  comes  to  seek  an  alliance  before  the  invasion  of  Africa,  at  a  magnificent 
banquet,  the  description  and  incidents  of  which  are  evidently  modeled  upon  the 
account  of  the  reception  of  Aeneas  by  Dido.  A  minstrel  sings  the  legends  of 
Hercules,  Atlas  and  Perseus,  and  the  founding  of  Carthage,  closing  with  an  epi- 
logue glorifying  Hannibal  and  Scipio,  and  prophesying  the  imminent  and  final 
contest.  Laelius,  at  the  request  of  Syphax,  then  recounts  the  deeds  of  Roman 
heroes,  of  the  Decii,  Curtius,  Regulus,  Brutus,  and  the  death  of  Lucretia.  As 
an  example  of  how  the  expression  sometimes  follows  Vergil  without  exactly  bor- 
rowing a  cento  from  him — a  peculiarity  already  noticed  in  Petrarch's  Latin — in 
the  prelude  to  his  account  of  the  Romans,  Laelius  says  : 

breviter  nostros  audire  triumphos 
Forte  putas  ;  brevior  narrantibus  exeat  annus, 

There  is  nothing  just  like  this,  we  believe,  in  the  Aeneid.     But  still  it  suggests  : 

casus  cognoscere  nostros, 

Et  breviter  Troiae  supremum  audire  laborem  ; 
and : 

Et  vacet  annalis  nostrorum  audire  laborum  ; 

Ante  diem  clause  componat  vesper  Olympo. 

There  is  just  a  half  suggestion  of  the  leonine  rhyme  in  both  of  the  last  two  lines 
quoted  that  may  have  helped  to  justify  in  Petrarch's  mind  the  use  of  the  full 
leonines  that  he  occasionally  weaves  into  his  Latin  verse,  as  we  shall  have  occa- 
sion to  note  below. 

Laelius'  narrative  also  contains  a  fine  characterization  of  the  Romans,  a  really 
grand  expression  of  the  Stoic  ideal,  that  makes  the  passage  worthy  to  be  com-  • 
pared  with  the  famous  Tu  regere  imperio  of  the  Aeneid  : 

Romanum  est,  si  nescis,  opus  contemnere  casus 
Fortuitos,  placide  venienti  occurrere  morti : 
Spernere  quae  gentes  aliae  mirantur  et  optant, 
Contra  autem  amplecti  quae  formidanda  videntur  ; 
Vincere  supplicia  et  tristes  calcare  dolores, 
Sponte  mori  potius  quam  turpem  degere  vitam. 


78  MEDIEVAL   AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

The  farewell  of  Massinissa  to  Sophonisbe  possesses  more  dramatic  truth,  is 
more  sincere  from  the  emotional  point  of  view,  than  any  other  episode  in  the 
poem.  The  whole  passage  is  too  long  for  quotation,  yet  it  should  be  read  entire 
in  order  to  do  justice  to  a  part  : 

Cara  mihi  nimium,  vita  mihi  dulcior  omni, 
Sophonisba  vale.     Non  te,  mea  cara,  videbo 
Leniter  aetherios  posthac  componere  vultus, 
Effusosque  auro  religantem  ex  more  capillos  ; 
Dulcia  non  caelum  mulcentia  verba  deosque 
Oris  odorati  secretaque  murmura  carpam. 
Solus  ero,  gelidoque  insternam  membra  cubili. 

Toward  the  close,  as  he  reads  the  tender  last  farewell  in  the  eyes  of  his  brid^, 
there  are  two  leonines  brought  in  almost  with  the  touch  of  inspiration  : 

Lumina  magnorum  mentes  tractura  deorum, 
Lumina  durorum  rabiem  fractura  virorum. 

To  an  ear  accustomed  to  the  rhyme  there  is  something  of  the  majestic,  solemn 
threnody  of  the  dirge  about  them. 

The  Africa  was  a  mistake,  but  it  was  the  mistake  of  a  genius.  Only  now  and 
then  does  it  rise  high  enough  to  give  us  a  passing  glimpse  of  what  must  have  been 
the  ideal  in  the  mind  of  the  poet.  It  is  like  the  ruins  of  a  half  completed  build- 
ing, where  the  architect  had  brought  together  noble  marbles  and  sculpture,  and 
had  begun  to  work  out  beautiful  pieces  of  detail,  but  where  there  was  a  radical 
defect  in  the  plan  or  the  means  at  the  builder's  disposal  that  rendered  the  com- 
pletion of  the  whole  impracticable.  It  is  doubtful  whether  Petrarch  ever  fully 
realized  this.  There  certainly  were  times  when  he  imagined  himself  walking  with 
the  two  or  three  immortal  masters  of  epic  verse.  In  the  second  book  of  the  Africa 
there  is  a  passage  where  the  elder  Scipio  gives  his  son  a  sort  of  prophetic  epitome 
of  his  own  future  history  and  that  of  the  Republic,  modelled  evidently  upon  the 
prophecy  of  Anchises  in  the  sixth  book  of  the  Aeneid  :  Two  bards  shall  herald 
the  glory  of  the  son,  the  contemporary  Ennius,  and  another  who  is  to  appear  in  a 
distant  generation  : 

Cernere  iam  videor  genitum  post  saecula  multa 
Finibus  Etruscis  iuvenem,  qui  gesta  renarret, 
Nate,  tua ;  et  nobis  veniat  velut  Ennius  alter  ; 
Cams  uterque  mihi,  studio  memorandus  uterque. 
Iste  rudes  Latio  duro  modulamine  Musas 
Intulit,  ille  autem  fugientes  carmine  sistet. 

In  one  sense  Petrarch's  position  in  Latin  literature  was  as  important  as  he  im- 
agined it  to  be.  It  was  he  more  than  any  other  who  recalled  the  fleeing  Muses  to 
Italy  and  reestablished  learning  in  its  old  seats.  But  he  was  not  to  do  this 
through  any  single  masterpiece.  In  this  respect  he  was  the  opposite  of  Dante. 
The  earlier  poet  by  one  work  of  surpassing  excellence  established  for  himself  an 
enduring  place  in  Italian  literature  and  for  Italian  literature  an  enduring  place  in 
the  literature  of  the  world.     The  later,  though  he  left  no  work  that  was  to  com- 


LATIN    OF    THE   RENAISSANCE.  79 

mand  the  undivided  attention  of  posterity,  exercised  an  influence  through  a  thou- 
sand devious  channels  that  makes  his  position  in  the  history  of  world  culture  per- 
haps even  greater  than  that  of  Dante. 

With  the  possible  exceptions  of  the  more  labored  portions  of  the  Africa, 
Petrarch's  Eclogues  give  the  least  evidence  of  poetic  inspiration  of  anything  that 
he  ever  wrote  in  verse.  It  is  difficult  to  see  where  he  made  any  very  essential 
advance  beyond  Dante  in  this  branch  of  Latin  composition.  The  allegorical  sig- 
nification of  the  poems  was  too  recondite  to  be  understood  without  a  commentary — 
Genus  est  quod,  nisi  ex  eo  ipso  qui  condidit  auditum,  intelligi  non  potest — as  the 
author  himself  confesses.  They  were  not  the  work  of  his  maturest  years,  and 
possibly  for  that  reason  savor  a  little  of  the  school  room ;  there  is  something  a 
trifle  scholastic  about  them.  We  are  more  than  once  informed,  also,  that  they 
were  written  with  incredible  rapidity.* 

There  are  twelve  of  the  Eclogues,  six  of  them  dealing  [with  contemporary  po- 
litical questions,  one,  the  ninth,  with  the  plague  of  1348,  and  the  others  with  mat- 
ters of  a  more  or  less  personal  and  private  character.  The  tenth  contains  a  long 
roll  call  of  those  writers  of  antiquity  with  whom  Petrarch  was  either  directly  or  in- 
directly familiar.  In  the  fourth  there  are  several  passages  in  praise  of  poesy, 
some  of  which  show  Petrarch  at  his  best  in  this  sort  of  writing  : 

Citharae  solatia  nescis  ; 
Rem  magnam,  si  nota,  voces.     Fastidia  mulcet ; 
Laxatos  animos  refovet ;  solatur  amicos  ; 
Gaudia  restitutit ;  pellit  de  pectore  luctum  ; 
Exsiccat  lacrimas  ;  compescit  flebile  murmur ; 
Spem  revehit,  frangitque  metum,  vultumque  serenat. 

There  is  a  passage  in  the  tenth  Eclogue  that  illustrates  to  what  extent  his  love 
for  Laura  was  in  Petrarch's  mind  always  more  or  less  a  sensual  image  of  his  devo- 
tion to  the  Muses.  Laura  was  the  Virgin  Mary  of  his  humanistic  cult.  A  laurel 
tree  typifies  both  Laura  and  poetry  in  the  following  : 

Fuit  alta  remotis 
Silva  locis,  qua  se  diversis  montibus  acti 
Sorgans,  nitens  Rhodano,  pallensque  Ruentia  miscent. 
Hie  mihi,  quo  fueram  Tusco  translatus  ab  Arno, 
(Sic  hominum  res  fata  rotant)  fuit  aridulus  rus  ; 
Dum  colui,  indigui,  atque  operi  successit  egestas. 
Id  reputans — avertor  enim — piguitque  laborum 
Pertaesumque  inopis  studii,  tandemque,  relinquens 
Arva  inarata,  vagus  silvis  spatiabar  apricis. 
Verum  inter  scopulos,  nodosaque  robora  quercus 
Creverat  ad  ripam  fluvii  pulcherrima  Laurus. 
Hue  rapior,  dulcisque  semel  postquam  attigit  umbra, 
Omnis  in  hanc  vertor ;  cessit  mea  prima  voluptas. 

*  Totum  Bucolicunt  carmen  absolvi,  quant  breve  dieruni  spatio  sinoris,  stupeas,  Ep. 
Fam.,  VIII.,  3  ;  incredibile  est  quam paucis  dtebus  absolverint,  Ep.  Fam.,  X.,  4. 


8o  MEDIAEVAL    AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

There  was  a  brief  period,  while  the  aceticism  of  the  Middle  Ages  was  disap- 
pearing but  its  spiritual  ideals  still  exercised  a  patent  influence  over  minds  of  the 
nobler  sort,  when  love — of  a  higher  type  than  that  of  the  Roman  poets — seems  to 
have  been  the  dominating  influence  in  determining  the  form  through  which  literary 
inspiration  sought  its  concrete  expression.  Beatrice  and  Laura — possibly  even  the 
Fiametta  of  Boccaccio — inspired  a  passion  of  this  sort,  a  passion  altogether  higher 
and  purer  than  that  of  the  Latin  lyricists  which  ultimately  drew  down  to  its  own 
level  the  later  erotic  poetry  of  the  Renaissance. 

In  closing  the  consideration  of  Petrarch's  Latin  poems  with  the  Epistles  we 
can  say  what  has  already  been  intimated  in  case  of  the  prose  letters,  that  in  this 
sphere  of  literature  we  see  more  than  anywhere  else  the  genial,  lovable  Petrarch, 
who  exercised  a  wider  influence,  perhaps,  through  his  personality  than  through 
his  writings.  The  Latin  catches  something  of  the  spirit  of  the  author  in  these 
letters,  and  follows  the  thought  with  the  simple,  meandering  ease  with  which  a 
brook  follows  its  course  down  a  valley.  We  seldom  stop  either  to  admire  or  to 
criticise  the  style,  but  are  merely  conscious  of  a  pleasing  effect,  without  our  atten- 
tion being  called  to  the  means  by  which  it  is  produced. 

Some  of  these  letters  are  very  modest  in  their  conception.*  There  is  one  to 
his  trees  that  quite  reminds  you  of  Bryant.  Some  have  a  patriotic  inspiration. 
Others  deal  with  the  simplest  details  of  Petrarch's  domestic  life.  There  are  none 
of  the  sixty-seven  poetical  epistles  that  are  not  worth  reading,  a  statement  that 
could  hardly  be  made  of  any  other  equally  voluminous  body  of  Latin  poems  writ- 
ten since  the  classic  age. 

Many  of  the  letters  deal  with  much  graver  subjects  than  the  one  from  which 
the  following  quotations  have  been  taken,  and  would  perhaps  be  in  a  way  more 
brilliant  illustrations  of  Petrarch's  style  in  writing  of  this  kind  ;  but  there  is  quite 
as  much  that  is  representative  of  the  qualities  that  make  the  letters  interesting  in 
the  following  as  in  any  of  the  others.  One  sees  that  neither  the  subject  nor  the 
treatment  is  very  ambitious,  but  he  is  nevertheless  pleased  with  the  unceremonious 
familiarity  of  it  all.  The  letter  is  to  the  Cardinal  Giovanni  di  Colonna,  thanking 
him  for  a  pet  dog  that  he  had  recently  sent  to  be  the  poet's  companion  in  the 
solitude  of  Vaucluse. 

Solamen  comitemque  viae  largiris  ;  at  ille, 
Sublim  de  sede  licet  venturus  ad  imas, 
Paret  et  iniectis  maestus  dat  colla  catenis  ; 
Et  sequitur,  nee  spernit  heri  mandata  minoris. 
Paulatim  minus  atque  minus  meminisse  relictas 
Delicias,  iam  prata  iuvant,  iam  lucida  tranans 
Flumina  mordet  aquas,  luditque  in  gurgite  puro. 
Fercula  iam  sibi  nostra  placent  et  libera  curis 
Otia  ;  deserti  non  ampla  palatia  regis 

*  It  is  in  the  metrical  epistles   that  we  have  the  well  known  praise  of  books,  Lib.  I.,  Ep.  7 : 

Illustres  nee  difficiles,  quibus  angulus  unus, 
Aedibus  in  modicis  satis  est,  qui  nulla  recessant 
Intperia,  assidueque  adsint  et  taedia  nunquam 
Ulla  fernnt  abeant  iussi  redeantque  vocati. 


LATIN    OF   THE   RENAISSANCE.  8 1 

Anteferat  variasque  dapes  ;  iam  panis  et  unda 
Sufficiunt,  et  parva  domus. 

Excubat  ante  foras.     Quotiens  me  longior  aequo 
Somnium  habet  fessum,  queritur  solisque  reversi 
Admonet  increpitans  et  concutit  ostia  plantis. 
.  Illicet  egressum  vultu  plaudante  salutat, 
Meque  praeit,  loca  nota  petens,  et  lumina  volvens. 

It  is  not  our  intention  to  enter  upon  an  extended  discussion  of  the  Latinity  of 
Petrarch.*  He  lived  before  any  critical  study  of  Latin  had  been  made,  before  the 
existence  of  printed  books,  when  indices  and  lexicons  and  the  other  practical  aids 
to  classical  scholarship  were  as  yet  a  thing  of  the  future.  It  is  not  strange,  then, 
that  his  Latin  is  more  or  less  empirical,  that  of  a  masterly  imitator  rather  than  of  a 
critical  scholar.  On  the  other  hand  there  is  much  true,  living  vitality  in  it  also. 
His  word  order  is  more  classical  and  his  sentence  structure  more  Ciceronian  than 
that  of  many  of  the  more  correct  writers  who  followed  him.  In  the  broad  rules 
of  syntax  he  seldom  errs.  The  subjunctive  is  used  in  subordinate  clauses  and  the 
infinitive  in  indirect  discourse  as  in  classical  writers.  He  occasionally  makes  slips 
in  the  use  of  the  reflexive,  or  in  prepositional  and  case  relations,  as  the  titles  of 
his  books — De  Viris  Illustribus  Viiae,  Rerum  Memorandariim  Liber — suggest. 
Perhaps  his  variation  from  a  classical  standard  is  most  frequent  and  noticeable  in 
case  of  certain  idiomatic  expressions  depending  upon  the  force  of  an  individual 
word.  So  we  find  in  the  life  of  Caesar :  quum  esset  Caesaris  intentio  in  Gallia 
hibernare,  page  2l6  ;  a proximioribus  hibernis^  page  224  ;  C.  Trebonii  ducatu  in 
castra  penetravit ;  Occasio  rebellantibtis  data  erat  historias  novas  in  Caesarem 
fingendi.  Sometimes  an  awkward  verse  occurs  in  his  poems,  as  in  the  Africa, 
where  Lucretia  says, 

Exemploque  mei  non  vivet  adulter  Romae. 

But  all  this  is  redeemed  by  the  naturalness  and  fluency  of  Petrarch's  Latin. 
It  is  not,  as  a  rule,  stilted  or  labored,  but  flows  with  such  grace  and  ease  from  his 
pen  that  even  his  errors  are  often  little  more  than  piquant,  as  if  they  betrayed 
carelessness  rather  than  ignorance. 

In  Petrarch  appears,  with  almost  Minerva-like  suddenness,  the  fully  developed 
Latin  of  the  Renaissance.  His  successors  had  little  else  to  do  than  to  polish  and 
perfect  what  he  had  rediscovered — to  wash  the  earth  stains  from  the  statue,  so  to 
speak.  But  he  possessed  more  than  he  transmitted.  He  lived  before  the  days  of 
microscopic  criticism,  and  wrote  with  a  freedom  and  ease  that  many  of  the  succes- 
sors lacked.  It  was  ancient  life,  not  ancient  forms,  that  he  wanted  to  bring  back, 
and  the  contents  of  his  works  always  governed  their  expression.  In  Petrarch, 
too,  the  higher  elements  of  mediaeval  culture  survived,  and  they  gave  a  certain 
seriousness  and  spiritual  depth  to  him  as  a  writer  that  we  look  for  in  vain  in 
those  who  followed  him.  His  significance  in  literature  and,  to  some  extent,  in 
Latin,  is  of  two  sorts.  That  which  depends  upon  his  relation  to  his  age  and  the 
events  that  followed  ;  and  that  which  comes  from  those  personal,  individual  ele- 
ments of  character  seen  through  his  works,  which  some  way  have  a  universal  in- 
terest, apart  from  any  period,  cult  or  intellectual  movement. 

*  This  has  already  been  done  very  exhaustively  by  Schneider  in  his  edition  of  the  life  of 
Caesar,  a  work,  however,  which  I  have  been  unable  to  consult. 


82  MEDIAEVAL   AND    RENAISSENCE    LATINITY. 

III. 

Erasmus  is  usually  seen  by  the  modern  observer  through  the  dust  of  the  great 
religious  conflict  that  was  just  beginning  during  the  last  years  of  his  life.  His 
attitude  toward  that  conflict  and  the  mighty  principles  that  animated  it  is  seen  in 
the  light  of  subsequent  events  ;  and  for  this  reason  the  humanist  is  often  forgotten 
in  the  reformer.  Yet,  if  we  take  that  word  in  the  technical  sense  applied  to  it  in 
connection  with  the  sixteenth  century,  Erasmus  never  was  a  reformer  at  all.  He 
was  a  humanist,  and  as  such  was  a  partisan  of  the  movement  that  ultimately  led  to 
the  Reformation.  But  the  sentiment  and  conviction,  the  whole  spirit  that  dom- 
inated the  later  movement,  was  something  that  remained  to  the  last  essentially 
foreign  to  him,  without  the  range  of  his  sympathies  or  his  understanding.  Even 
when  he  is  forced  at  last  to  take  a  tardy  and  half-hearted  part  in  the  contest,  he 
exclaims  in  remonstrance  :  Ego — ex  cultore  Musaruni  fio  gladiator. — Ego  semper 
in  campis  Musaruni  versatus,  in  hanc  cruentam  pugnam  protrudor.^  To  the  last 
he  sees  in  the  whole  disturbance  but  some  sort  of  an  attack  upon  the  liberal  arts. 
It  is  humanism,  his  cult,  that  is  being  undermined  or  assaulted.  As  late  as  1529 
he  writes  :  Hie  igitur  est  fons  et  seminarium  huius  totius  tragoediae,  if7imedicabile 
odium  linguarum  et  bonarum  literarum.\  Keen  sighted  as  he  was,  and  conscious 
as  he  was  of  the  abuses  that  existed  in  the  Church,  Erasmus  never  appreciated  his 
own  position  in  the  movement  that  it  was  to  follow,  nor  the  importance  that  move- 
ment was  to  assume.     In  this  respect  he  is  like  Petrarch,  a  man  of  two  epochs. 

Turning  aside  from  the  theological  arena  and  confining  ourselves  to  the  field 
of  literature  alone,  the  three  phenomena  that  characterize  the  sixteenth  century  are 
wider  interpretation  and  imitation  of  ancient  life,  the  reform  in  education,  and  the 
founding  of  vernacular,  national  literature  in  northern  Europe,  with  a  position 
equal  to  that  of  the  ancient  tongues.  In  each  one  of  these  three  phases  of  intel- 
lectual activity  Erasmus  took  his  part,  and  though,  in  a  rather  paradoxical  way, 
our  subject  is  concerned  chiefly  with  the  last  of  them,  we  shall  review  briefly  the 
preceding  two  before  proceeding  to  its  further  consideration. 

At  the  time  of  Erasmus'  birth  the  Renaissance  spirit  had  been  domiciled  south 
of  the  Alps  for  over  a  century,  and  it  was  just  beginning  to  send  a  vivifying  thrill 
through  the  scholastic  fogs  that  hung  over  the  northern  lands.  Erasmus  felt  the 
touch  of  this  spirit  through  the  medium  of  his  Deventer  master,  Alexander  Hegius, 
a  pupil  of  the  great  Agricola,  the  apostle  of  the  new  learning  in  Germany.  From 
that  time  he  seems  to  have  owed  to  himself  more  than  to  his  teachers,  and  to  have 
struggled  up  through  all  the  difiiculties  of  an  adverse  environment  to  become,  what 
he  undoubtedly  was,  the  first  humanist  of  Europe.  It  was  through  letters,  rather 
than  his  personal  experience  as  a  teacher,  that  he  exercised  an  influence  wide 
enough  to  entitle  him  to  this  distinction.  Aside  from  his  brief  pedagogical  career 
at  the  English  universities,  and  his  merely  perfunctory  duties  as  honorary  director 
of  the  trilingual  school  at  Louvain,  he  took  no  direct  part  in  public  instruction. 
But  with  the  exception  of  some  of  his  controversial  writings,  all  that  he  ever  wrote 
bore  directly  or  indirectly  upon  the  restoration  of  ancient  letters.  To  this  pointed 
his  activity  as  an  editor.    There  is  a  savor  of  printer's  ink  about  him  stronger  than 


*Ep..  715,  ni.,833,  F. 
fEp.,  545,  III.,  595,  C. 


"^  B  rt  A  l^y 

J^fI■VERSITT 


LATIN    OF   THE    RENAISSANCE.  83 

the  mould  of  manuscripts,  as  if,  like  Franklin  or  Greely,  he  had  lived  within  con- 
stant sound  of  the  press.  At  Venice,  and  later,  during  the  fruitful  autumn  of  his 
life  at  Bale,  he  was  in  fact  a  publisher,  the  literary  head  of  the  greatest  press  in 
Europe.  Even  in  his  theological  works  the  exegetical  character  and  the  philolog- 
ical and  culture-history — to  use  a  Germanism — aspect  predominates.  His  letters 
and  all  his  pedagogical  works,  more  numerous  and  important  than  those  of  any 
other  contemporary  writer,  and  perhaps  his  greatest  single  work,  the  Adages,  the 
most  important  scholarly  contribution  that  had  so  far  been  made  to  modern  litera- 
ture, were  all  of  them  but  more  or  less  elaborate  treatises  or  weapons  in  the  cause 
of  humanism.  In  the  preface  to  the  Colloquies  Erasmus  expressly  states  his  ob- 
ject in  writing  them  to  be  to  entice  boys  to  the  study  of  Latin. 

It  is  interesting  for  us  to-day,  when  the  ancient  tongues  are  usually  studied 
with  the  scalpel  and  dissecting  knife,  to  see  how  the  sixteenth  century  linguist, 
who  secured  a  real  mastery  of  the  two  classic  languages  in  the  course  of  his  life- 
time, would  start  children  out  on  the  highway  of  learning.  Latin,  of  course,  is 
the  foundation  and  corner-stone  of  a  liberal  education.  In  the  matter  of  method 
Erasmus'  views  may  have  been  a  little  ideal  for  his  time,  but  they  are  certainly 
rational  and  in  line  with  modern  tendencies.  He  would  begin  with  the  object 
lesson  and  the  literary  anecdote. 

The  child  should  begin  to  learn  a  language  early,  while  the  imitative  faculty  is 
still  strong,  and  is  exercised  involuntarily  or  with  actual  pleasure,  as  it  is  in  case 
of  parrots  and  starlings.  It  is  a  good  thing  in  order  to  get  a  mastery  of  a  language 
to  be  brought  up  among  talkative  people.  A  child  learns  more  readily  and  thor- 
oughly if  the  subject  discussed  is  depicted  to  him  in  a  picture  or  drawn  upon  the 
board.  This  is  true  also  in  learning  the  names  and  qualities  of  trees,  plants  and 
animals,  especially  those  that  are  not  common,  as,  for  instance,  the  elephant  or 
the  rhinoceros.  Suppose  you  have  on  the  board  an  elephant  whose  fore  legs  are 
in  the  toils  of  a  python.  The  youngster  is  at  once  interested  in  the  new  picture. 
Now  what  does  the  teacher  do?  He  explains  what  the  great  big  animal  is  called 
by  the  Greeks,  and  that  the  Latin  name  is  the  same,  except  that  it  is  declined  ele- 
phanhis,  elephanti.  He  points  out  and  gives  the  Greek  name  for  the  proboscis, 
and  tells  them  that  the  Latins  called  this  the  vianus,  because  the  elephant  hands 
itself  its  food  with  it.  He  calls  attention  to  the  fact  that  the  elephant  does  not 
breathe  with  its  mouth,  but  with  its  proboscis,  and  bids  the  child  note  the  long 
tusks,  from  which  we  get  ivory,  at  the  same  time  showing  an  ivory  comb.  He 
tells  them  about  the  huge  Indian  serpent  called  the  python,  and  givgs  its  name  in 
both  Greek  and  Latin.  He  also  explains  that  there  is  bitter  enmity  between  the 
elephant  and  the  python. 

Then  what  is  more  pleasing  than  the  tales  of  the  poets  ?  Their  fables  are  so 
delightful  to  children  that  they  remain  with  them  in  after  life,  not  only  found- 
ing their  knowledge  of  the  language,  but  also  teaching  them  to  form  sound- 
judgments,  and  adding  to  their  store  of  literary  expressions.  What  does  a  child 
hear  with  more  pleasure  than  Aesop's  fables,  where  moral  truths  are  taught  in 
sport  as  it  were  ?  The  same  is  true  of  the  other  stories  of  the  ancient  poets.  A 
boy  is  told  about  the  companions  of  Ulysses  turned  into  swine  and  other  brutish 
forms  and  laughs  at  the  story ;  but  at  the  same  time  he  gets  a  glimpse  of  the  fact 
that  men  who  are  not  governed  by  reason,  but  are  carried  away  by  their  animal 


84  MEDIiEVAL   AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

instincts,  are  not  men,  but  beasts.  And  leaving  aside  for  a  moment  the  moral 
training,  think  what  a  true  appreciation  of  the  real  force  of  words  they  thus  get, 
something  wonderfully  rare  even  among  those  famous  for  their  learning  to-day. 
Finally  let  children  learn  brief  and  pithy  quotations  of  the  proverbial  sort,  and  the 
sayings  of  illustrious  men  ;   for  these  once  contained  the  sum  of  all  philosophy. 

In  regard  to  grammar  he  says  :  **  While  I  appreciate  the  necessity  of  this,  I 
should  wish  it  taught  in  the  least  possible  compass,  and  only  what  is  best.  I  have 
never  approved  the  common  custom  of  keeping  boys  grinding  at  this  subject  for 
several  years."  He  would  teach  Latin  and  Greek  together,  making  each  support 
the  other. 

In  reading  the  Latin  authors — and  reading  should  commence  as  soon  as  pos- 
sible— Erasmus  would  begin  with  Terence,  ' '  whose  style  is  pure,  terse,  colloquial, 
and  whose  subjects  naturally  interest  children,"  One  might  add  if  he  chose  some 
of  the  less  objectionable  comedies  of  Plautus.  Then  should  come,  in  the  order 
named,  Vergil,  Horace,  Cicero,  and  Caesar.  One  might  add  Sallust.  These 
authors  would  suffice  for  a  complete  mastery  of  Latin.  Erasmus  has  no  sympathy 
with  those  who  spend  their  whole  lives  in  unrolling  parchments  in  order  to  learn 
the  language,  and  think  no  one  a  Latinist  who  has  let  the  smallest  volume  escape 
him. 

This  all  refers  to  what  we  should  call  preparatory  education.  Beyond  this  lies 
the  university  training,  the  mastery  of  science  and  philosophy  and  the  professional 
branches.  But  meanwhile  we  must  not  despise  or  neglect  social  education.  And 
especially  if  one  cultivates  the  acquaintance  of  learned  men,  whose  daily  conver- 
sation contains  much  that  is  well  worth  knowing,  he  will  learn  many  things  with- 
out much  labor.  For  besides  their  social  chat  and  their  every-day  talk  he  will 
hear  at  luncheon  perhaps  as  many  as  eight  of  the  most  brilliant  sayings  of  famous 
authors  quoted  or  alluded  to,  and  a  like  number  at  dinner.  Consider  what  this 
means  for  one  in  the  course  of  a  year.  Then  if  one  constantly  hears  good  Latin 
is  there  any  reason  why  he  should  not  become  familiar  with  the  language  in  a  few 
months  to  the  same  extent  that  illiterate  boys  do  with  French  or  Spanish  in  an 
equal  time  ? 

Of  course,  the  moral  side  of  education  is  always  emphasized  in  Erasmus' 
works.  We  feel  a  little  less  in  touch  with  his  way  of  treating  this  subject,  per- 
haps ;  there  is  a  sort  of  abnormal,  Sandford  and  Merton  goodness  expected  of  his 
boys  that  really  would  hardly  be  desirable  in  a  nineteenth  century  school  in  Amer- 
ica. In  regard  to  discipline  he  utters  an  indignant  protest  against  the  brutality  of 
the  masters.  A  generous  minded  boy  should  have  his  spirit  cultivated,  not 
broken. 

If  in  the  position  of  a  public  man  in  which  his  scholarly  attainments  had 
placed  him  Erasmus  stands  at  the  parting  point  of  the  humanists  and  the  reformers, 
if  he  feels  himself  carried  way  from  the  Fortunate  Isles  of  literary  ease  upon  a 
current  of  thoughts  and  events  which  he  cannot  control,  and  which  seems  to  be 
hurrying  him  out  into  a  boundless  sea  of  intellectual  and  religious  anarchy,  he 
finds  himself  as  an  author  in  a  position  no  less  anomalous.  As  a  writer  he  stands 
at  the  boundary  of  New  Latin  and  the  Vernacular  literature.  His  popular  works 
no  sooner  leave  his  hands  than  they  don  the  garb  of  an  unknown  tongue  and 
hurry  off  into  channels  beyond  his  control.     When  Luther  meets  him  with  a  doc- 


LATIN    OF    THE    RENAISSANCE.  85 

trinal  tract  in  German  he  feels  very  much — to  use  Feugere's  expression — like  an 
armored  knight  brought  face  to  face  with  a  musket.  The  laborers  and  craftsmen 
were  beginning  to  discuss  theological  questions  in  the  taverns,  the  peasants  were 
rising,  a  restless  spirit  of  nationality  was  beginning  to  assert  itself,  the  first  throes 
of  a  new  era  were  convulsing  society.  The  influences  that  were  working  these 
changes  embraced  in  their  sphere  Erasmus  and  the  humanists  as  well.  But  they 
were  obliged  to  overcome  in  this  instance  a  disciplined  resistance  that  they  did  not 
meet  in  the  mere  inertia  of  the  masses.  Yet,  in  order  to  cope  successfully  with 
the  new  questions  arising,  Latin  itself  must  again,  as  in  the  days  of  the  Goliardi, 
descend  from  the  schools  into  the  street.  In  such  works  as  the  Colloquies  we 
see  the  beginning  of  a  popular  New  Latin  literature,  a  vernacular  Latin  so  to 
speak,  that  failed  to  attain  importance  only  because  it  was  so  soon  succeeded  by 
the  literature  of  the  native  tongues.  A  more  detailed  study  of  this  Latinity  will 
not  be  uninteresting,  even  if  it  be  only  to  show  how  unconsciously  and  instinc- 
tively popular  Latin  clings  to  the  same  distinctive  features,  whether  it  be  in  the 
hands  of  a  Roman  writer  or  of  a  Latinist  of  the  Renaissance. 

Erasmus  was  not  inspired  with  the  feeling  of  nationality.  He  was  not  a 
patiiot.  In  weighing  the  desirability  of  this  land  as  against  another  as  a  place  of 
residence  the  thought  that  one  is  his  native  country  never  occurs  to  him.  He  is  a 
citizen  only  of  the  republic  of  letters.  His  own  nationality  he  prefers  to  leave  in 
doubt.  In  one  letter  he  says  :  "I  neither  assert  nor  deny  that  I  am  a  French- 
man ;  being  so  bom  that  I  can  reasonably  doubt  whether  French  or  German." 
To  another  friend  who  remonstrates  with  him  for  his  indifi:erence  in  the  matter 
he  says:  "It  doesn't  seem  to  me  to  make  much  difference  where  a  person's 
born."  This  sentiment,  then,  could  hardly  have  been  a  literary  influence  with 
Erasmus. 

With  reference  to  his  mother  tongue,  we  gather  from  his  letters  that  he  had 
not  entirely  forgotten  it.  He  understood  it  colloquially,  but  he  seems  to  have 
had  it  in  no  literary  command.  He  refused  the  position  of  public  reader,  volun- 
tarily offered  to  him  at  Louvain  by  the  city  magistrates,  because  of  his  poor  com- 
mand of  the  language,  and  he  speaks  in  another  place  of  not  writing  in  Dutch,  in 
correspondence  with  a  friend,  because  of  the  difficulties  that  the  language  offered. 
He  speaks  in  one  case  of  having  written  a  letter  in  bad  French,  and  a  colloquial 
knowledge  of  the  language  is  implied  in  his  account  of  an  adventure  with  robbers 
while  travelling  from  Amiens  to  Paris.  There  is  a  hint  in  the  Colloquies  of  the 
way  he  learned  this  language.  We  have  no  reason  to  suppose,  however,  that 
Erasmus  could  use  French  in  a  literary  way.  We  know  that  he  knew  neither 
English  nor  Italian,  even  to  the  extent  of  carrying  on,  in  those  languages,  a  broken 
conversation.  There  is  some  reason  to  believe  that,  probably  from  its  kinship  to 
Dutch,  he  could  read  a  little  German.  Of  course,  Erasmus  wrote  Greek  with 
some  facility,  but  he  learned  that  language  late  and  his  mastery  of  it  was  always 
far  from  perfect.  However,  this  would  have  no  importance  in  connection  with 
his  writings  in  any  case.  As  a  literary  man,  therefore,  Erasmus  was,  as  he 
would  have  said,  unilingual.  He  was  confined  to  Latin.  That  was  the  language 
in  which  he  thought,  wrote  and  passed  his  life.  There  is  no  doubt  but  that  this 
fact  narrowed  his  sympathies  somewhat,  and  made  him  less  responsive  to  the 
popular  influences  that  were  the  vital  element  in  the  world  about  him.     But  it 


86  MEDIEVAL    AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

did  not  exclude  them  entirely.     They  acted  inductively  upon  his  works  and  deter- 
mined the  current  of  feeling  in  them. 

The  Colloquies  might  be  termed  vernacular  works  in  a  Latin  garb.  They  are 
in  spirit  entirely  modern,  without  a  suggestion  of  antiquity  about  them.  For  this 
reason  partly  their  Latinity  is  unique,  as  we  shall  see  later.  They  to  some  extent 
embody,  epitomize  the  Renaissance  and  the  Middle  Ages  at  the  same  time,  but 
from  the  point  of  view  of  a  spectator,  not  of  a  participant ;  and  the  fact  that  there 
is  a  shimmer  of  satire  or  playful  mockery  over  the  whole  does  not  lessen  the  effect 
of  the  contrast.  Society  in  Erasmus'  time  was  a  rather  incongruous  medley  of  en- 
lightenment and  ignorance,  liberalism  and  superstition,  high  ethical  ideals  and 
immoral  practices — a  sort  of  carnival  preceding  the  lent  of  the  Reformation.  It  is 
this  society  that  Erasmus  paints  in  a  series  of  genre  pictures,  with  a^  Hogarthian 
touch  that  heightens  the  caricature  just  enough  to  give  point  to  the  moral.  It 
required  a  master  of  the  language  to  do  this  in  Latin,  and  a  master  of  human 
nature  to  do  it  at  all. 

Erasmus  is  so  intimately  associated  in  our  minds  with  the  beginning  of  the 
Reformation  that  we  naturally  expect  him  to  be  directing  the  shafts  of  his  satire 
against  mediaeval  superstition  and  ecclesiastical  abuses.  And  as  a  matter  of  fact — 
though  the  theological  aspect  of  the  Colloquies  lies  beyond  the  scope  of  our  sub- 
ject— there  is  something  extremely  modern  in  the  way  he  views  and  ridicules  some 
of  the  more  obvious  inconsistences  in  the  religious  belief  and  customs  of  his  times. 
He  antedates  Mark  Twain's  story  about  the  cross  by  over  three  centuries,  in  the 
Peregrinatio  Religionis  Ej'go,  where  he  says  that  it  is  exhibited  publicly  and 
privately  in  so  many  places  that  "if  all  the  fragments  were  collected  in  one  place 
they  would  freight  the  largest  transport.  And  yet  our  I^ord  and  master  bore  his 
whole  cross  alone  !"  And  in  connection  with  the  milk  of  the  Virgin,  often  ex- 
hibited as  a  sacred  relic,  he  exclaims  :  "  Oh  mother  most  like  unto  her  son  !  He 
left  his  blood  in  such  abundance.  But  she  has  betowed  her  milk  upon  the  world 
so  lavishly  that,  even  had  the  babe  used  none,  we  could  scarce  believe  it  from  a 
woman  with  a  single  child." 

We  probably  have  a  picture  from  life  in  the  Funus,  where  the  bed  chamber  of 
the  dying  officer  is  filled  with  the  tumult  of  the  members  of  the  fovu:  mendicant 
orders  clamoring  for  a  share  in  the  spoils  of  the  estate,  and  the  priest  refuses  to 
administer  supreme  unction  because  the  dying  man  had  previously  confessed  to  a 
Franciscan.     The  vijgo  poenitens,  who,  we  are  led  to  infer,  had  lost  her  maiden- 
hood in  a  monastery,  the  credulous  pilgrim  who  leaves  wife  and  children  to  per- 
form vows  at  distant  shrines,  the  sensual  abbot  who  prefers  illiterate  monks  because 
they  don't  talk  back,  and  places  the  pleasures  of  the  table  and  the  chase  before 
those  of  literature,  are  but  fly-leaf  sketches,  faces  caught  from  the  crowd  that 
buffeted  and  jostled  along  the  highway  of  sixteenth  century  life.     And  in  most 
cases  we  feel  that  there  is  not  much  partisanship,  much  ill-feeling  or  theological 
fervor  in  all  this  friendly  ridicule.     It  is  not  the  coarse,  bitter  satire  of  the  Goliard, 
or  the  fiery  invective  of  the  reformer  that  we  see  as  a  rule.     Only  occasionally  is 
there  an  exception,  as  in  the  Mernardus,  where  Erasmus  had  a  personal  grievance 
to  settle,  or  now  and  then  in  the  allusions  to  the  monks,  towards  whose  whole  life, 
habits,  and  tastes  his  involuntary  attitude,  from   early   childhood,  it  seems,  had 
been  hostile  and  repugnant. 


LATIN   OF   THE   RENAISSANCE.  87 

The  side  lights  upon  the  culture  of  the  time  are  beyond  numbering;  for  they 
pervade  a  whole  work,  as  they  do  a  modern  novel.  The  recent  discovery  of 
America  is  referred  to  frequently.  The  insulae  nuper  inventae  had  just  begun  to 
appeal  to  the  imagination  of  the  people,  and  to  take  the  place  that  the  Holy  Land 
and  the  Levant  had  formerly  held  as  the  realm  of  adventure  and  unknown  possi- 
bilities. The  spirit  of  nationality,  as  we  have  seen,  had  become  so  far  developed 
as  to  make  national  customs  and  characteristics  the  theme  of  frequent  observation 
and  remark.  Sometimes^ there  is  a  general  comparison,  as  in  the  Encomium 
Moriae  :  **  The  English  pride  themselves  above  all  things  upon  their  fine  persona^ 
appearance,  music,  and  a  good  table  ;  the  Scotch  upon  nobility  and  relationship 
to  the  king,  and  on  account  of  their  skill  in  dialectic  controversies  ;  the  French 
upon  their  polite  manners  ;  the  Italians  upon  their  literary  culture  and  eloquence, 
and  especially  because  they  are  the  only  ones  in  the  world  who  are  not  barbarians. 
The  Greeks  consider  themselves  the  inventors  of  the  sciences,  and  boast  of  the 
heroic  deeds  of  their  ancestors  ;  the  Spaniards  yield  to  none  in  martial  glory  ; 
while  the  Germans  flatter  themselves  upon  their  physical  stature  and  delight  in 
the  occult  arts."  In  another  passage  we  are  told  that,  "  In  Italy  men  salute  each 
other  with  a  kiss,  which  would  seem  extremely  absurd  in  Germany,  where  men 
shake  hands.  Again,  in  England  men  greet  ladies  when  they  meet  in  church, 
which  would  be  considered  disgraceful  in  Italy.  It  is  also  a  mark  of  attention  in 
England  to  offer  your  cup  to  one  coming  in  at  a  banquet,  while  to  do  the  same 
thing  in  France  would  be  an  insult."  France  is  the  land  of  economy  in  Erasmus' 
mind.  This  is  indicated  by  the  scrupulous  care  of  the  French  to  get  a  dinner  in 
return  from  every  guest  whom  they  entertain.  They  encourage  conversation  at 
the  table  in  order  to  lessen  the  consumption  of  wine.  Their  preference  for  pork 
is  attributed  to  the  fact  that  it  is  less  expensive  than  other  kinds  of  meat.  Their 
love  of  flowers  is  due  to  their  forming  an  attractive  ornament  for  a  scantily  covered 
table.  A  liardus  sufflces  to  purchase  them  a  dinner.  At  the  same  time,  however, 
a  French  inn  is  an  ideal  stopping  place  for  a  traveller.  There  you  find  neatness, 
courteous  attention,  and  a  table  whose  excellence  is  only  surpassed  by  its  cheap- 
ness. Jacobus,  in  the  Opulenta  Sordida,  after  being  nearly  starved  by  a  penurious 
host  in  an  Italian  city,  goes  to  recuperate  to  a  vemistissimwn  Galloru7n  contuber- 
nium.  Quite  different  from  this  is  the  German  inn.  There  you  are  received 
with  scant  courtesy  and  few  accommodations.  You  act  as  your  own  servant, 
and  are  expected  to  spend  your  time  when  indoors  in  the  common  living 
room,  where  you  are  packed  in  with  two  or  three  score  other  guests  of  all 
ages  and  conditions.  The  temperature  of  the  place  is  kept  so  high  that  you 
are  tempted  to  believe  that  the  German  idea  of  hospitality  is  associated  some 
way  with  a  profuse  flow  of  perspiration.  If  you  venture  to  open  a  window  ever 
so  little  there  is  immediate  and  universal  expostulation  on  the  part  of  those  as- 
sembled, and  the  landlord  directs  you  to  carry  your  heterodox  views  about  fresh 
air  to  some  other  hostelry.  You  all  contribute  equally  toward  purchasing  the 
wine  for  dinner,  and  he  is  the  most  popular  who  drinks  the  most.  Cheese 
abounding  in  vermin  and  in  the  last  stages  of  putrefaction  winds  up  the  banquet, 
and  in  due  course  of  time  you  are  shown  to  a  bed  whose  linen  was  last  washed  a 
month  before.  Then  there  is  the  Italian  in  the  Naufragium,  excitedly  invoking 
curses  upon  the  gods  of  the  upper  and  lower  worlds  with  tragic  gesticulations  be- 


88  MEDLEVAL    AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

cause  he  had  entrusted  his  life  and  his  precious  chattels  to  so  *' barbarous"  an 
element.  It  is  considered  sufficient  apology  for  a  dull  story  to  say  that  it  is  Dutch. 
But  ErasDfius  more  than  once  praises  the  honesty  and  humanity  of  his  fellow  coun- 
trymen, though  in  the  letters  he  chides  their  contempt  or  indifference  for  liberal 
studies  and  literatvure.  He  evidently  looked  upon  them  as  good,  plodding  people 
of  the  bovine  sort,  and  rather  wondered  how  his  own  little,  ners'ous,  vivacious 
self  ever  grew  out  of  such  a  boggy  environment. 

We  are  often  reminded  in  the  Colloquies  of  the  fact  that  four  centuries  have 
made  a  great  change  in  all  the  more  delicate  refinements  of  life  in  Western  Eu- 
rope. We  get  an  impression  that  the  sixteenth  century  scholar  and  priest  went 
around  onustus pediculis,  and  even  royal  magnificance  seems  to  have  been  like  that 
of  the  Russian  ambassadors  at  the  court  of  W^illiam,  who  advanced  "  dropping 
pearls  and  vermin  at  each  step."  A  witticism  that  is  anything  but  delicate  ap- 
pears in  the  conversation  between  a  young  matron  and  a  gentleman  friend  at  the 
opening  of  the  Puerpera.  A  still  more  curious  illustration  of  the  broadness  of 
language  tolerated  by  the  custom  of  the  time  appears  in  the  defense  of  the  Collo- 
quies. In  the  dialogue  Adulescentis  et  Scorti  Erasmus  made  the  young  woman  ad- 
dress her  former  lover  as  Alea  mentula.  As  he  prided  himself  that  he  had 
made  "the  language  of  the  brothel  chaste"  in  this  colloquy,  his  sense  of  jus- 
tice is  outraged  that  a  few  over-pruddish  critics  have  found  anything  indelicate  in 
the  word,  *'  a  form  of  address  in  very  common  use  even  among  our  most  respect" 
able  matrons." 

The  tendency  to  usurp  those  prerogatives  of  dress  and  fashion  that  had  formerly 
belonged  exclusively  to  the  nobility  was  beginning  to  appear  among  the  women  of 
the  middle  class.  The  goodwife  must  dress  in  silk  and  fine  linen  and  costly  fm-s 
while  her  husband  mends  shoes  at  home.  Pearls  are  already  too  common  for  her 
use,  but  she  must  have  more  costly  gems.  Her  train  is  fully  as  long  as  my  lady's, 
and  if  my  lady  have  footmen,  she  must  have  not  only  footmen  but  pages.  Nor 
will  she  yield  one  whit  to  a  dame  of  the  bluest  blood  at  table,  though  her  husband 
be  a  tradesman.  Even  the  nobility  are  so  far  forgetting  themselves  as  to  marry 
from  the  lower  classes,  and  a  monstrous,  hybrid  class  is  thus  arising  that  belongs 
to  neither  rank.  If  this  complaint  is  not  Erasmus'  own,  it  is  at  least  put  into  the 
mouth  of  a  dame  of  rank  in  the  Senatulus. 

Domestic  comforts  are  becoming  more  common.  Glazed  windows  that  turn  on 
hinges  in  the  French  style  are  in  general  use  in  private  houses,  and  the  master 
views  his  orchard  and  fowl  yard  from  a  hammock  swung  in  the  gallery.  Sanitary 
precautions  are  a  matter  of  some  concern.  Cattle  must  be  slaughtered  at  proper 
times  and  places.  Erasmus  would  discourage  the  habit  of  using  cups  in  common, 
and  of  sleeping  together  upon  ordinary  occasions.  Legislation  regarding  the  poor 
is  agitating  the  thoughts  of  statesmen — probably  England  is  thought  of  in  this 
connection.  Erasmus'  attitude  towards  women  is  liberal.  He  suggests  that  they 
should  have  a  voice  in  choosing  a  husband  for  a  daughter,  and,  though  more  than 
half  jokingly,  that  they  might  be  entrusted  with  some  of  the  minor  municipal 
magistracies.  On  the  other  hand  he  does  not  approve  of  dame  schools,  or  of 
women  as  teachers  for  boys,  as  their  temper  is  too  uncertain.  He  does  sympathize 
heartily,  however,  with  what  we  should  call  the  higher  education  of  women, 
English  and  possibly  Italian  influences  had  something  to  do  with  this.     W^e  must 


WiVERSITT 


LATIN    OF    THE    RENAISSANCE.  89 

remember  that  women  had  taken  degree,  and  taught  at  Bologna,  and  Thomas 
More's  daughters  had  been  their  father's  companions  in  his  studies.  The  genera- 
tion of  Lady  Jane  Grey  was  just  appearing  upon  the  scene. 

Printing  had  brought  a  new  sort  of  vagabonds  into  the  community.  The  tramp 
printer  seems  to  have  been  coaeval  with  the  invention  of  the  art  itself.  There  are 
always  starving,  "  impecunious  country  editors  "  to  be  found  ready  for  any  scheme 
that  promises  a  financial  return.  They  are  most  convenient  tools  for  the  impostor 
who  would  secure  notoriety  or  political  and  social  influence  by  means  of  the  press. 

While  Erasmus  looks  upon  the  people,  the  mobile  vtdgus,  with  something  like 
aristocratic  reserve,  and  considers  the  masses  the  worst  possible  adviser  in  a  matter 
of  importance,  he  is  not  less  exacting  upon  their  rulers  for  this  reason.  Upon 
occasion  he  satirizes  the  princes  just  as  keenly  as  he  does  the  priests.  Erasmus' 
political  philosophy  seems  to  have  been  learned  from  Aquinas,  who  always  held  a 
rein  over  his  views  despite  his  humanistic  antagonism  to  scholasticism.  Scotus, 
however,  receives  no  mercy  at  his  hands.  He  is  non  fons  Mzisarum,  sed  lacus 
ranarum,  and  his  name  is  punned  with  aKorog-.  Except  in  some  special  applica- 
tions there  is  always  a  lurkicg  feeling  of  hostility  toward  dialectics  and  scholasti- 
cism in  Erasmus'  mind  that  leads  him  to  let  a  shaft  fly  at  them  whenever  his  sub- 
ject brings  him  within  range.  In  full  accord  with  this,  his  attitude  toward  the 
pagan  authors  is  friendly.  He  does  not  feel  the  passionate  devotion  of  Petrarch 
for  the  ancient  world  ;  his  judgment  is  more  mature  and  critical ;  but  he  is  inspired 
with  enthusiasm  whenever  classical  antiquity  appeals  to  his  thoughts  or  his  im- 
agination. Aristotle  anticipates  Paul  in  an  important  dogma,  and  Cicero  is  an 
inspired  writer  whose  books  he  feels  inclined  to  kiss  with  reverence  when  he  opens 
them.  Often  when  reading  the  ancient  philosophers  or  the  poets  he  comes  across 
something  so  chaste,  so  sacred,  so  inspired,  that  he  cannot  persuade  himself  but 
what  some  holy  spirit  brooded  over  them  when  they  wrote.  Perhaps  the  spirit  of 
Christ  has  spread  farther  than  we  suspect,  and  there  are  many  in  the  Congregation 
of  Saints  that  we  have  not  in  the  Calendar.  Sometimes  one  can  hardly  refrain 
from  saying  :    Sancte  Socrates,  ora  pro  nobis. ^ 

In  so  far  as  they  record  incidents  of  his  own  time,  the  Colloquies  are  to  a  great 
extent  a  slightly  embellished  account  of  Erasmus'  personal  experiences,  or  of 
events  and  occurrences  that  came  under  the  observation  of  himself  and  his  friends. 
There  is  more  Wahrheit  than  Dichtung  in  the  conversation  of  his  motley  troop  of 
puppets,  as  a  comparison  of  the  epistles  with  the  dialogues  shows.  In  fact,  a 
skeleton  biography  of  Erasmus'  life  might  be  reconstructed  from  the  Colloquies 
alone.  His  early  student  days  at  Paris  are  pictured  in  the  account  of  Montagu 
college  in  the  Ichthyophagia,  and  an  unpleasant  lenten  experience  at  Freiburg — 
Eleutheropolis — is  described  in  the  same  dialogues.  Oftener  the  allusion  is  not  so 
obvious.  The  Convivium  Poeticum  seems  to  be  modeled  upon  reminiscences  of 
Paris  dinners  of  earlier  times,  one  of  which  is  described  in  a  letter  written  by 
Erasmus  for  one  of  his  pupils.  Somewhat  similar  are  some  of  the  references  to  the 
pest,  to  the  campaign  of  Julius  the  Second  against  the  French,  and  to  the  loss 
of  his  money  through  the  British  customs'  officers. 

*  The  question  of  Aristotle's  salvation  had  been  seriously  discussed  in  the  mediaeval  schools. 
Ibid.,  Lambertus,  De  Salvatione  Aristotle's  Stagivitae.  Abelaird  thought  Socrates  was  among 
the  saved. 


90  MEDIEVAL    AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

Occasionally  Erasmus  repeats  a  good  story  from  one  of  his  Renaissance  prede- 
cessors. He  gets  fromPoggio's  Facetiae  the  anecdote  told  of  the  sailor  in  the 
Naufragium,  who  promises  St.  Christopher  at  Paris  a  wax  candle  as  large  as  his 
own  giant  statue  at  that  place  if  he  reaches  shore  in  safety,  and  when  admonished 
by  a  bystander  of  the  impossibility  of  ever  performing  his  vow,  bids  him  hold  his 
peace,  lest  he  suggest  the  same  thought  to  the  Saint  himself.  A  number  of  court 
anecdotes  of  Louis  the  eleventh  are  preserved  in  the  Colloqtiies,  most  of  them 
turning  to  the  advantage  of  the  king,  and  suggesting  the  fancy  that  that  shrewd 
old  monarch  was  not  so  unpopular  with  the  commons  as  he  had  been  with  the 
historians. 

One  notices  a  number  of  literary  coincidences  in  reading  Erasmus,  ideas  and 
expressions  that  have  appeared  in  later  literature  or  in  the  bon  mots  and  anec- 
dotes of  wits  and  literary  men.  These  are  quite  possibly  accidental  in  many  cases. 
The  borrowings  that  Rabelais  made  from  Erasmus  have  already  been  discussed  in 
a  special  monograph.  The  following  few  examples  from  English  sources,  which 
might  be  multiplied  indefinitely  by  one  curious  in  such  matters,  illustrate  one 
phase  of  the  kinship  between  Erasmus'  writings  and  the  popular  literature  of  a 
later  date. 

In  the  opening  of  the  Convivium  Religiosum,  the  sentence  Non  est  muta 
rerum  natt0-a,  sed  tisqueqiiaque  loquax  est,  multaque  docet  contemplantem,  sug- 
gests, in  thought  at  least,  Shakespeare's 

Finds  tongues  in  trees,  books  in  the  running  brooks. 
Sermons  in  stones,  and  good  in  everything. 

However  St.  Bernard  had  already  said  :  Aliquid  amplius  invenies  in  silvis  quam 
in  libris  ;  ligna  et  lapides  docebunt  te  quod  a  magistris  audire  non  potes. 

*'  All  the  world's  a  stage  and  men  and  women  players,"  is  more  fully  devel- 
oped in  the  Encomium :  Porro  mortalium  vita  omnis  quid  aliud  est  quamfabula 
quaepiam,  in  qua  alii  aliis  obtecti  personis  procedunt,  aguntque  suas  quisque 
partes,  donee  choragus  educat  e  proscenia.  This  idea  of  life' s  being  a  comedy 
where  each  acts  his  part  pervades  all  Erasmus'  writings.  Partes  agere,  primas 
tenere  and  the  like  are  almost  idioms  with  him.  Of  course  the  classical  predeces- 
sor of  Rip  Van  Winkle  is  referred  to  in  the  storj'  of  Epimonides,  and  the  account 
of  the  newly-discovered  island  where  the  people  live  without  labor  upon  the  spon- 
taneous fruits  of  the  soil,  and  punish  most  severely  of  all  crimes  the  breaking  of 
the  marriage  vow,  though  even  here  the  women  are  forgiven,  but  the  men  are 
compelled  to  go  forever  membro  pudendo  vela  obtecto,  smacks  strongly  of  Gulliver. 
Pseudochei,  who  had  practiced  lying  assiduously,  but  had  only  attained  his  pres- 
ent perfection  in  the  art  because  he  was  born  with  unusual  endowments  for  it, 
might  be  compared  to  Dr.  Johnson's  friend,  who  might  have  been  born  a  fool, 
but  must  have  devoted  much  study  to  improving  upon  it  since.  Erasmus'  odd 
conceit  about  having  fat  bodies  for  winter  and  lean  ones  for  summer  may  have 
suggested  Sydney  Smith's  midsummer  wish  to  "  take  off  his  flesh  and  sit  in  his 
bones." 

There  are  artistic  defects  in  the  Colloqtiies.     The  characters  and  situations  are 

a  little  uniform,  the  former  representing  more  often  types  than  individuals.     But 
this  work  is  different  from  anything  else  written  in  Eatin.     It  is  sui  generis,  and 

so  is  its  Latinity. 


LATIN    OF    THE    RENAISSANCE.  9I 

There  is  an  impression  of  variety,  of  versatility  of  expression  produced  by 
Erasmus'  Latin,  after  reading  a  classical  author,  that  is  somewhat  deceptive,  and 
that  greater  familiarity  with  his  works  corrects.  He  does  not  use  an  unusually 
extensive  vocabulary,  and  his  syntax  is  as  a  rule  extremely  simple,  modeled 
upon  Terence  and  Plautus  rather  than  upon  Cicero,  and  almost  as  limpid  and  direct 
as  that  of  modern  French.  His  language  is  derived  from  so  many  different  periods 
and  different  styles,  however,  that  the  effect  is  rather  confusing  to  one  accus. 
tomed  only  to  the  harmonious  unity  of  a  classical  writer.  But  that  despite  this 
variety  his  vocabulary  is  almost  a  meagre  one,  relatively  speaking,  may  be  inferred 
from  the  fact  that  in  an  estimate  based  in  each  case  upon  about  33,000  words  of 
text  we  find  in  the  Colloquies  an  average  vocabulary  per  looo  words  of  64 ;  while 
in  Nepos'  Lives  or  Cicero's  Orations  it  is  approximately  100,  and  in  the  first  six 
books  of  the  Aeneid,  including  proper  names,  it  is  nearly  250. 

This  is  due  in  part  to  the  colloquial  character  of  the  Latin ;  the  uniformity  in 
characters  and  situations  already  noted  reproduces  itself  in  the  language.  The  Col- 
loquies also  give  us  a  good  deal  of  ex  persona  Latin  that  is  not  Erasman,  from  the 
point  of  view  of  Latinity,  any  more  than  Sam  Weller'  s  English  represents  Dickens' 
best  command  of  our  own  tongue.  For  instance,  the  priest,  in  the  Funus,  who 
crushes  his  rival  with  the  pompous  assertion  :  Ego  sum  sacrae  theologiae  bacca- 
laureus  formatus,  mox  licentiandus,  atque  etiam  doctoris  iitulo  insigniendus,  uses 
the  dialect  of  his  class,  of  course,  as  do  the  other  speakers  in  that  dialogue. 

The  words  worthy  of  note  in  the  Colloquies  and  the  Enconiiui7i  Moriae  include 
some  coined  by  Erasmus  himself,  or  by  his  Renaissance  contemporaries. 

I.  Feminine  forms  in  -trix :  architectrix,  800,  E,  also  occurs  twice  in  En- 
comium Moriae  ;  comtrix,  853,  C  ;  concionatrix,  740,  B  ;  fortunatrix,  486,  A ; 
largitrix,  408,  A ;  lotrix,  853,  C ;  obtrectatrix,  808,  C ;  propagatrix,  412,  C ; 
tutatrix,  855?  B. 

2.  Many  new  diminutives :  adspersiuncula,  868,  D  ;  affectatiuncula^  659,  A  ; 
animalculum  (ascribed  to  Muretus  by  Krebs),  457,  A ;  caerimoniola, /^^g,  Ay 
502,  D  ;  cerula,  a  taper,  450,  B ;  cogiiatiuncula,  650,  B  ;  compotatiuncula,  646, 
E  ;  constitutiunculuniy  801,  B  ;  degustatiuftcula,  504,  B  ;  diutuscule  (^diuscule 
occurs  in  Augustine),  655,  F;  do7iarioltim,  779,  'Q;  fragmentulum,  781,  B; 
historiola,  447,  D  ;  obesulus,  693,  B,  756,  D  ;  observatiunctila,  801,  B  ;  officioluniy 
638,  F ;  pedunculus,  721,  D  ;  persuasiuncula,  452,  A  ;  plantula,  768,  D  ;  prae- 
ceptiunculum^  653,  C  ;  praemiolum,  780,  F  ;  precula,  709,  C ;  rosariola,  809,  A  ; 
salariolum,  767,  D  ;  sahitatumctday  809,  A  ;  sanctulus,  650,  C  ;  stillula,  504*  A  > 
timidulus  {thnidule  occurs  in  Apuleius),  487,  C;  traditiuncula,  473,  C,  474,  A; 
verbulum,  492,  D. 

3.  Somewhat  akin  to  the  diminutives  are  the  words  with  the  weakening  pre- 
fix sub  :  stibaridus,  763,  A  ;  subblaesus,  802,  E  ;  subclaudico,  829,  A  ;  sublascivus, 
665,  C ;  subscateo,  780,  A  ;  subsibilo,  856,  E  ;  subuvidus  {subudus  occurs  in  late 
Latin),  644,  D;  suffuscatus,  749,  C;  suppulans,  807,  D.  Semi-  also  has  a 
weakening  force  in  some  of  the  following  compounds  :  semicalciaius,  801,  F, 
869,  D ;  semicyathuSy  866,  B  ;  semifatuus,  820,  B  ;  semimater,  'j'j'^,  B ;  semipu- 
trius,  865,  E  ;  semireptilis,  709,  C  ;  semisapiens,  452,  A.  On  the  other  hand  the 
strengthening  prefixes  are  used  much  more  rarely  :  sesqui-  is  used  this  way  in 
sesqinhaereticus,    "a  heretic  and  a  half,"  719,  E  (Erasmus  also  coins  perhaps 


92  MEDIEVAL    AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

sesquianuus,'j'^?>,  D),  and  two  instances  of  new  compounds  with  ^(?r  intensitive 
occur,  permurmuro,  485,  D,  and  perpulchre^  819,  E;  perhenignusy  815,  D,  was 
doubtless  classical,  2,%  perbenigne  occurs  in  Cicero  and  Terence  ;  percalciatus,  801, 
F,  is  an  antonym  to  semicalciahis,  mentioned  above  ;  though  in  mediaeval  Latin 
percalciare  refers  to  a  custom  of  beating  the  bounds  in  land  transfers. 

4.  There  are  a  few  new  abstracts  of  Latin  derivation  :  balbuties  for  haesitantia^ 
414,  B,  773,  B ;  caecutientia,  a  nuance  of  caecitas,  approaching  blindness,  from 
the  late  Latin  caecutire,  885,  C  ;  coniptura  for  comptus,  418,  E;  acrtatio  and 
longatio,  753,  C,  are  quoted  street  Latin  terms ;  digladiatio,  from  digladior,  a 
Ciceronian  word,  459,  B,  462,  C,  872,  C ;  opploratio,  'Jl^,  B  ;  plagium,  plagiar- 
ism, 460,  B  [plagiarius  used  for  plagiarist  by  Martial,  is  found  with  its  original 
sense  of  kidnapper,  636,  C);  putiditaSy  421,  D  ;  to  which  might  be  added  sclaptus, 
sclaptu  digitoruin,  715,  D. 

5.  Quite  a  number  of  Greek  words  appear  in  Latin  garb :  battalogia,  832, 

E  ;  bulimia,  787,    F,  862,  D  ;  chiromaniicus,  737,  D  ;  epialus,  665,  F  ;  epomiSy 

doctor's  hood,  742,  C;  grammatophorus,  781,  A;  henas,  826,  C;  heptatechnuSy 

736,  A;  ichthyophagus,  665,  F;  idolate,  667,  B  ;  leberis,  639,   B  ;  monotechnus, 

736,  A;  nomotheta,  665,  E;  oenopolus,  642,  C,  and  oenopola,  742,  D  {onopolium 

in  Plautus)  ;  oniropoli,  686,  B  ;  onocratati,  815,  F ;  operopolis  ('*  vel fructuaria  "  ), 

761,  C;   Ossa,   822,    D;  pandochetis  for  cupo,   TIT,  F  ;  paraphrenesis,  804,  E  ; 

penia,   758,   K',  philautia,  421,   E;  phUotesia    (sc.   pocula),  healths,  419,   D; 

pinaceum  [pinax,  plate  in  Du  Gange)  plate,  tray,  trencher,  717,  D;  polyphagia 

polypkagus  in    Suetonius),   866,  C;  polyposia,  866,   C,  proaemia,  802,  F,  and 

proemium,  758,  C,  et passim,  are  used  for  introduction,  hegvamng  ;  progymnasmas, 

836,   E  ;  protopii'us ,  for  tiro,   736,   D  ;  sychophanticus,   837,   B  ;  syrriphoniscuSy 

440,  C ;  symposiarch,  760,  B  ;  syncretismus,  8l2,  C  ;  syphar,  862,  D  ;  typographi, 

835,  E. 

6.  Among  the  miscellaneous  words  are  a  few  compounds  not  found  in  Forcel- 
lini  or  Du  Cange  :  admentior,  75 1,  C  ;  depraedico,  752,  C  ;  derudo,  741,  A  ;  im- 
musso,  751,  E;  praemando  (the  participial  form  praejJiansi) ,  773,  C  ;  suppositOy 
465,  A  ;  and  also  funambrilus,  rope  walker,  866,  E ;  lactijluus,  780,  C  ;  mtilo- 
triba,  muleteer,  probably  a  mediaeval  word  {muhts -{-rpl^i]),  483,  C;  tinipes, 
838,  B. 

7.  A  number  of  words  do  not  admit  easily  of  classification.  Among  these  are  a 
ievf  2id.\Qrhs,  f/'ustulatim,  685,  C  ',  gaudenter,?>^6,  F;  incircumspecte,  649,  B  ;  in- 
definenter,  637,  B  ;  irreparabiliter,  864,  E ;  taurice  (valeotaurice),  632,  D  ;  tkeo- 
logiter,  492,  D.  There  are  also  some  adjectives  :  amfraduosus  [amfractus  in  Du 
Cange),  838,  C  ;  bombardicus  ;  cacatilis,  foul,  824,  E  ;  cardinalitins  (belonging  to 
a  cardinal),  691,  B;  clitellatus,  832,  A;  convivatorius,  819,  E;  extemporarius ^ 
407,  B  ;  gestictilosus,  644,  F  ;  menticulosus,  665,  E ;  nervaceus,  772,  E ;  pota- 
ticus,  831,  D  ;  praestigiatorius,  884,  D  ;  praestrenuus,  756,  C. 

8.  A  few  nouns  and  verbs  do  not  fall  under  any  of  the  preceding  classes  :  con- 
fabulones,    709,   A;  exhilarator   (^exhilaratio  in    Du    Cange),  676,   E;  extorsio 

(which  is  the  equivalent  in  form  of  extortio  in  Du  Cange),  812,  T> ;  fabulamen- 
turn,  437,  A;  holosericati,  818,  A;  incrustamenttim  [incrustura  in  Du  Cange), 
674,  C  ;  latero,  ''^  later  ones  et  ambulones,^^  844,  B  ;  naviculator  (once  thought  to 
be  in  Cicero,  cf.   Krebs),  864,  D  ;  notaria,  844,    D  ;  promotor,  for  adiutor,  483, 


LATIN    OF   THE   RENAISSANCE.  93 

C ;  qtiaestoria,  844,  D ;  responsator,  745,  C ;  telus,  toll,  778,  E ;  urticetunty 
nettle  bed,  738,  E ;  utricines,  bagpipers,  827,  A ;  circumcursito,  685,  D  ;  vapesco^ 
to  became  vapid  (of  wine),  66 1,  D. 

9.  Erasmus  occasionally  uses  classical  words  in  novel  senses  or  relations  : 
asininus,  stupid,  435,  A  ;  auriculae,  the  ears  on  a  fool's  cap,  742,  B  ;  caballus, 
in  the  mediaeval  sense,  '■^  si  bellos  almit  caballos,^^  479,  D;  calcu'us,  score,  re- 
spect, **  Quo  quidefn  calculo  superant  pueritiam,^''  414,  B  ;  quod  sint  viris  multis 
calcuUs  fortunatiores,  418,  D  ;  charta,  card,  439,  B,  and  chartarius,  card  player, 
836,  A;  concionator,  priest,  406,  A;  inter  coniugatos  (sc.  convivas),  699,  F; 
condonatio,  for  indulgentiae  (640,  B),  444,  A  ;  se  dilaiat,  **he  is  puffed  up," 
448,  A ;  divide,  explain,  eioco^  give  in  marriage,  elocare  liberos,  636,  B,  844,  D ; 
eliquo,  to  clear  up,  of  ore  or  metal  yielding  material,  758,  D;  exhaustus 
exhausted,  work  out,  422,  D  ;  fasictdi,  fagots,  852,  A  ;  fro7itispicium  (mediae- 
val, fagade),  frontispiece,  title  page,  850,  A;  gales  (sc.  navis),  crow's  nest, 
712,  C;  iacula,  shafts  of  wit,  repartee,  716,  A;  inauspicatus,  unlucky,  inauspi- 
cious, hecticus,  feverish,  789,  D  ;  lucernarius,  burning  midnight  oil ;  philosophi, 
lucernarii,  422,  E;  periodus  (in  original  sense,  423,  A),  saeculortwt  periodus, 
I,  747,  B;  7-escribo,  ascribe,  422,  E;  succino,  suggest,  446,  A;  umbratilis,  im- 
material, ghostly,  cymbam  umbratilem,  830,  D. 

It  is  rather  curious  to  see  how  Erasmus  employs  old  words  or  coins  phrases 
out  of  old  words  to  express  modern  ideas,  or  to  denote  modern  things.  In  con- 
nection with  a  dwelling  house  we  find  comix,  a  knocker,  766,  A  ;  sera,  lock; 
**  reliquit  clavini  in  sera,^^  836,  E  ;  museion,  a  dressing  room  (study,  668,  F,  and 
830,  E),  718,  E  ;  aesHiarium,  716,  C,  hypocaustum,  716,  D,  vaporarium,  739,  B, 
all  indicate  the  heated  living  room  or  public  room  of  an  inn,  the  sign  is  a  tabula 
pejtsilis,  739,  B  ;  vitreae  fenestrae  volubiles  are  glazed  French  windows,  688,  C, 
and  pensile  cubictdum  is  possibly  a  hammock,  689,  B,  while  meta  distillatoria, 
769,  E,  is  apparently  a  still.  Ruscula  insularia,  862,  F,  seem  to  have  been 
tenement  house  courts.  Vestis  coronis  is  a  lady '  s  train  ;  pallium  sacrum,  a 
priest's  surplice,  762,  A  ;  apposititia  coma,  a  wig,  432,  A  ;  galerum  cardiftalitium, 
a  conventional  term,  means  a  cardinal's  hat,  691,  B,  856,  B  ;  while  ocreae  means 
regularly  leather  leggins,  644,  C,  716,  D.  Courtiers  are,  ^2X^x0}^^ ,  proceres  aulici, 
480,  C  ;  spiculator  publicus  is  apparently  a  police  official,  808,  D.  Daduchi, 
813,  E,  and  histriones  luetics,  346,  B,  are  hired  mourners,  and  the  death  knell 
is  strepittis  cajnpanarum,  816,  B.  Quadrulae  and  orbes,  667,  A,  are  small  dishes, 
while  discus,  849,  B,  is  used  for  femdum,  course.  Cultellus  escarius  is  a  table 
knife,  865,  B,  a.nd  gladiolus  scriptorius  is  a  penknife.  Sp/iaera  pensilis,  688,  E, 
is  a  geographical  globe,  and  sphaerida  boDibarbica  a  shot,  815,  B.  A  squirrel's 
cage  is  cavea  rotatilis,  775,  A,  a  fast  day,  dies  pisculentus,  737,  E,  and  infantulus 
means  cherub,  771,  A,  and  rem  divinam,  mass,  762,  A.  Erasmus  does  not  use 
{he  regular  mediaeval  term  rosaria,  for  rosary,  once.  In  one  instance  he  uses  the 
diminutive  rosariola,  809,  A,  in  another  sphaerulae  precatoriae,  866,  E,  and  upon 
one  occasion,  when  he  feels  particularly  humorous,  he  employs  the  metaphor, 
ova  serpentuum,  774,  13. 

We  exclude  from  the  following  list  of  mediae\^al  words  technical  theological 
terms,  proper  names  of  persons  and  places,  and  words  which  are  merely  quoted  for  il- 
lustration, without  forming  an  integral  part  of  the  text,  such  as  the  list  of  mediaeval 


94  MEDIEVAL   AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

titles  on  page  620  of  the  Colloquies.  The  words  cited  are  as  a  rule  those  that  do 
not  appear  in  the  body  of  Forcellini's  Lexicon,  but  are  found  in  Du  Cange,  A 
very  few  words  that  were  doubtless  common  in  Latin  before  the  Renaissance 
period  but  are  not  to  be  found  in  the  latter  work  are  given  first.  They  are, 
alcuviista,  an  alchemist,  754,  B  (We  also  find  alcumisticus^  corresponding  to 
alchymistici  va.  Du  Cange,  752,  F,  et  passim y  and  alcumistica  (sc.  ars)  used  ab- 
solutely for  alchemy,  id. ) ;  aristocraiia,  as  we  have  seen,  is  found  in  scholastic 
Latin;  cacodaemones,  evil  spirits,  701,  E,  is  found  in  the  Ada  Sli.  Ignatii ; 
comjnissarius,  commissioner,  642,  F  ;  galeata  navis,  862,  D,  a  galley  [JVavis 
galea^  it  will  be  remembered,  occurs  in  the  Gesta')\  halbadarcha,  halberd,  831, 
D;  perhaps  ionchertcs,  Junker,  cadet,  young  nobleman,  835,  E;  sophista,  769, 
C,  for  a  doctored  horse.  Du  Cange,  however,  gives  an  instance  in  the  statutes  of 
Marseilles  where  sophisticare  means  to  adulterate.  Sophista  in  the  Waltharius 
means  a  wise  man,  elder,  sage. 

The  words  found  in  Du  Cange  may  be  classified  as  follows  : 

( 1 )  Official  terms  relating  to  the  ecclesiastical  or  civil  organization  :  copista, 
483,  C;  feudum,  828,  B;  heroina,  a  baroness,  744,  F;  marchio,  717,  E; 
monarcha,  633,  D  ;  momus,  a  proper  name  in  the  Encotnitim,  means  mummer  in 
mediaeval  Latin,  416,  D;  officiarius,  764,  D;  parochus^  as  priest,  811,  B,  et 
passif?i ;  secrelarius,  483,  C;  and  the  canon  law  terms,  irregularitas,  872,  A; 
repressalia,  830,  A,  and  simonia,  801,  E. 

(2)  Associated  with  the  official  church  terms  are  certain  words  and  phrases 
referring  to  matters  of  ritual;  aqua  lustralis  and  aqua  sacra,  700,  E;  814,  E;  ca- 
lendarium  sanctcru77i,  691,  F;  horariae  preces,  754?  T) ;  horae  canonicae,  746, 
C  ;  nocturnales,  ?)'J2,  B  ;  and  words  that  received  a  special  meaning  later  through 
being  applied  to  particular  orders  or  sects  of  orders :  conventuales,  869,  E,  and 
penitentiarii,  720,  A.  Relating  also  to  the  ecclesiastical  side  of  mediaeval  life 
are  a  few  such  words  as  bulla,  a  papal  bull,  from  the  earlier  meaning,  seal,  640,  B  ; 
capero  [caparo  in  Du  Cange,  probably  cognate  with  capul  and  our  word  cap),  a 
monk's  hood,  856,  A,  868,  B  ;  mitra,  which  received  its  special  raieaning  about 
the  tenth  century,  7^0,  D  ;  campana,  816,  B,  and  Jtola,  783,  B,  81 1,  F,  for  bells, 
are  probably  mediaeval  or  very  late  Latin  ;  and  refectonum,  refectory,  802,  D. 

(3)  Erasmus'  cosmopolitan  experience  is  illustrated  in  the  variety  of  coins 
mentioned  in  the  Colloquies :  bagathinum,  probably  cognate  with  bagatelle,  a 
very  small  Italian  coin,  864,  D  ;  carolinus  (not  mentioned  in  Du  Cange),  720, 
B;  coronatus,  762,  E;  ducatus,  685,  ^',  florenus,  764,  D;  liardus,  668,  F;  re- 
galis  aureus,  751,  A  ;  scutatus,  668,  F. 

(4)  Among  the  words  not  easily  classified  are  two  referring  to  war,  bombarda 
(probably  cognate  with  bombus,  a  gun),  708,  F,  and  snafanus  {^snaphtanus ,  in 
Du  Cange),  a  word  of  Germanic  derivation,  probably  from  schnappen,  from  which 
comes  our  word  knapsack,  meaning  a  "bummer"  or  irregular  soldier,  742,  E. 
There  are  also  the  diminutives  conviviolum,  669,  D,  horula,  688,  C,  and  lami- 
nula,  724,  A.  Monachismus,  the  life  or  observance  of  a  monk,  700,  F,  sabbatis- 
mus,  the  observance  of  the  sabbath,  792,  E,  are  conventional  derivatives.  Other 
words  coming  under  this  general  head  are  baccalaureus,  802,  A  ;  cambire,  667, 
F;  cerevisarius ,  835,  A  ;  cimelium,  763,  A  ;  corbona,  an  offesring,  795,  C  ;  fruc- 
tuaria,  an  apple-woman,  761,  C;  fustanius,  fustian,  834,  E;  magistraliter,  466, 


LATIN    OF    THE   RENAISSANCE.  95 

A;  merdosuSf  85 1,  D;  pandocheum,  inn,  715,  F;  perspicillum  (also  conspicilia 
and  octdaria  in  Du  Cange),  spectacles,  673,  C,  780,  E;  reiuvenesco,  826,  F; 
tymbus,  tomb,  813,  E. 

We  have  seen  enough  of  Erasmus'  vocabulary  to  infer  already,  what  we  find 
to  be  true,  that  the  sermo  plebius  furnished  a  not  inconsiderable  list  of  words  to  his 
Latin.  Omitting  the  theological  terms,  which  would  have  been  justified  even  in 
the  language  of  a  purist,  we  shall  consider  here  only  those  words  that  have  a  place 
in  general  literature  in  virtue  of  their  signification,  if  not  of  their  form.  We  shall 
classify  them,  however,  with  reference  to  their  source  rather  than  to  their  form  or 
meaning. 

( 1 )  The  Vulgate  furnishes  architriclinus,  head  waiter,  760,  B  ;  camalis^ 
carnal,  799,  E;  cinericicius  (possibly  in  Varro),  ashen,  ash  gray,  823,  A;  cir- 
cumcisio,  790,  F ;  concupiscenlia,  418,  B  ;  cornupeta^  horned,  742,  D ;  cortina^ 
curtain,  653,  D  ;  decimatio,  tithes,  792,  C  ;  glorijico,  687,  C ;  ieiuno,  684,  A ; 
ilhiminatiis,  465,  A;  immolatitius ,  681,  D;  inconsuHlis,  466,  E;  invisibilia 
(used  absolutely),  509?  A ;  iustifico,  814,  B  ;  lanciarius,  found  also  in  an  inscrip- 
tion, a  pike-man,  859,  E  ;  latomi^  stone-cutters,  821,  D ;  leprosus,  828,  E ;  mag- 
nates, 737,  D  ;  mansio,  in  sense  of  mansion,  683,  B  ;  manzar,  **liberi  ex  incesto 
nati,"  811,  C;  momenianeus,  7nortifieatio,  867,  E;  nuditas,  684,  F;  obstetricOy 
766,  D ;  obturatio,  788,  E ;  orphanus,  816,  E ;  perstillo,  770,  E ;  regulus,  for 
basilisk,  739,  E ;  sanctificator,  687,  D  ;  scandalum,  798,  B  ;  sigillaiim,  413,  A. 

(2)  The  following  words  appear  first  in  the  patristic  writings  :  Tertullian 
leads  with  confabulatie  {librorum),  which  perhaps  should  be  assigned  to  the 
Vulgate,  ^^  Bonos  corrutnpant  mores  cojtfabtilationes  malae,^'  ad.  Ux. ,  II,  3  ;  641, 
B  ;  elemosyria ,  684,  A  ;  ethnictis,  a  pagan,  applied  more  especially  to  the  philos- 
ophers, 676,  C  ;  exorcismtis,  749,  A  ;  illecto,  841,  D  ;  inauguration  786,  F ; 
laicits,  792,  A;  martyr,  783,  C;  monasteriolum,  ^f^^,  B;  natatilis,  824,  E; 
nudipes,  886,  P;  ogdoas,  841,  A;  ovicula,  8n,  B;  patriarcha,  698,  F;  rheto- 
ricor,  475,  A.  From  St.  Jerome  come  antagonista,  460,  C;  ciicuUa,  a  monk's 
hood,  643,  A;  lucernula,  687,  E;  monachus,  652,  E,  and  monacha,  6qS,  B; 
sophistria,  deceptrix,  745,  D ;  while  Augustine  first  uses  in  literature  deliciose, 
886,  C;  excommtinicatus  (the  superlative  is  found  in  Erasmus),  728,  C  ;  inscru- 
tabilis  (used  absolutely  in  the  Vulgate),  669,  C;  phiiosophaster,  423,  B  ;  purga- 
torius  (sc.  ignis  for  ignis purgans) ,  814,  B  ;  submurmuro,  856,  E. 

(3)  There  are  also  many  words  that  belong  to  very  late  Latin — many  of  them 
from  the  Christian  writers — that  can  hardly  be  classified  according  to  authors. 
Some  are  from  the  glosses  and  scholia,  or  the  inscriptions.  To  this  latter  class 
belong  aedificiohis,  found  only  in  inscriptions  and  probably  coined  anew  by 
Erasmus,  689,  C ;  anarchia,  766,  E ;  donatitius,  763,  D  ;  fascinator,  752, 
F;  logodaedali,  ^^  artifici  sermonis  fabricatores,^^  433,  C;  micatio,  772,  C; 
praestigium,  673,  D  ;  precatitincula,  692,  C,  et  passivi ;  saginator,  664,  C ; 
From  the  late  writers  come  accino,  accent,  749,  E ;  aggravatio,  483,  D ; 
anatomia,  811,  A;  cancellarius,  763,  E;  cardinalis  (from  cardo,  hinge,  mean- 
ing originally  a  chamber  attendant) ;  cereolus,  for  taper,  443,  C  ;  dapsilitas,  887, 
D  ;  dedecorosus,  719,  A  ;  filiatio,  465,  A  ;  imj?iediate,  799,  B ;  insensibiliter, 
728,  B  ;  irreconciliabilis ,  676,  B ;  irreftitabilis,  852,  B  ;  minutia,  721,  E  ;  mon- 
asteriufn,  652,  E ;  mutatoritim,  741,  E ;  myriades,  641,  C ;  paganismus,  'jg2, 
D  ;  protervia,  828,  B  ;  scortatio,  720,  B  ;  siticula,  647,   D ;  sub-indico,  764,  E. 


g6  MEDIAEVAL   AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

Under  the  previous  head  we  have  mentioned  a  number  of  words  that  are  cited 
but  once  in  the  lexicon  references.  There  are  many  others  of  this  class,  but 
drawn  for  the  most  part  from  a  better  period  of  Latin,  that  occur  in  the  vocabulary 
of  humanists.  This  cosmopolitan  featvire  of  his  verbal  apparatus  is  not  peculiar 
to  Erasmus,  but  is  characteristic  of  the  greater  part  of  New  Latin  literature. 

These  words,  occurring  in  the  works  of  a  single  Roman  writer,  and  even  there 
frequently  used  but  a  single  time,  had  in  many  instances  worked  their  way  into  the 
Middle  Age  vocabulary,  and  doubtless  formed  part  of  the  school  room  speech  that 
the  Renaissance  writers  acquired  together  with  their  conversational  mastery  of  the 
language ;  so  the  objection  that  they  were  less  familiar  than  the  regular  classical 
term  could  not  be  urged  against  them.  They  also  in  a  certain  way  add  variety  to 
the  language,  and  enable  an  author  to  avoid  repetition  occasionally,  serving  the 
same  purpose  that  the  Saxon  and  Romance  synonyms  do  in  our  own  language  in 
this  respect.  As  an  illustration  we  quote  a  sentence  from  the  Puerperay  which 
might  be  matched  a  number  of  times  in  the  Colloquies ;  Estne  igitur  corporeus 
ajiimus,  ut  a  rebus  corporalibus  affi.ciatur?  On  the  other  hand  a  late  Latin  word 
that  on  account  of  its  frequent  use  in  Christian  literature  was  more  familiar  to  his 
readers  than  the  classical  term  sometimes  entirely  displaces  the  latter  in  Eras- 
mus' writings.  So  we  find  alimonia  regularly  for  alimentum  and  ambulacrum 
for  ambulatio. 

Of  those  words  which  stand  in  Latin  literature  upon  the  authority  of  a  single 
writer  very  many,  naturally,  come  from  Cicero.  In  accordance  with  what  we 
already  have  seen  as  to  the  familiar  character  of  Erasmus'  style,  we  find  a  large 
number  of  Ciceronian  diminutives  ;  ambulatiujicula,  672,  F  ;  cantiuncula,  677, 
A;  695,  D;  labecula,  769,  B;  mei'cedula,  708,  D;  negotiola  (found  also  in 
Plautus),  635,  B;  munusculum^  687,  F;  perpusillus^  733,  C  ;  praediolum  (once 
also  in  Pliny),  672,  E  ;  pulchellus,  756,  D;  and  leguleius,  818,  A,  et passij?i.  The 
last  word  had  been  a  favorite  with  the  early  humanists  in  their  attacks  upon  the 
jurists,  who  represented  the  mediaeval  party  in  the  Italian  universities.  Other 
Ciceronian  words  not  appearing  elsewhere  in  classical  literature  are  asotus,  660, 
E  ;  compoiatio,  417,  A ;  cotnpotor,  639,  F  ;  injicialis,  802,  C  ;  oscitanter,  724, 
Yj\  pervetustus,  778,  A;  politia^  675,  D;  purpurasco  (of  grapes),  693,  A  ; 
rusticat  0,  country  life,  672,  E;  sannio,  740,  B;  779,  C;  iubdubito  ;  and  myro' 
tkecium,  which  is  Greek  in  Cicero  and  is  one  of  the  words  of  that  language  found 
only  in  the  works  of  a  Roman  writer,  748,  B. 

It  is  a  curious  fact,  though  one  not  especially  remarkable  when  we  consider  un- 
der what  conditions  the  restoration  of  ancient  Latin  took  place  at  the  time  of  the 
Renaissance,  that  many  words  coined  or  employed  by  the  earliest  Roman  writers 
and  neglected  entirely  so  far  as  we  can  learn  by  their  successors,  seem  to  have  been 
restored  to  full  right  of  citizenship  in  the  vocabulary  of  the  humanists.  Some  of 
these  words  were  doubtless  archaic  or  plebeian  by- forms  that  continued  to  be  used 
in  the  colloquial  language  until  they  were  taken  up  into  Christian  literature.  Such, 
for  instance,  was  adhaesus,  772,  A  ;  which  after  appearing  in  Lucretius  worked 
along  in  the  subterranean  depths  of  the  language  until  it  came  to  light  again  in 
the  Vulgate.  So  common  a  word  in  Christian  times  as  hymnus,  676,  C,  had  been 
taken  into  Latin  by  Lucilius  in  the  second  century  B.  C.  The  same  writer  also 
uses  combiboy  640,  B,  which  also  appears  later  in  Cicero,  however  ;  and  his  con- 


/^  99  T«»  ^ 

f  UN^IVERSITT 

LATIN    OF    THE    RENAISSANCE.  97 

temporary  or  predecessor  Pacuvius  cicuro,  which  Erasmus  uses  of  intellectual  dis- 
cipline, 850,  A  and  B.  Nigreo,  675,  C,  comes  from  the  same  writer.  The  early 
comedian  Turpilius  \x?>^^  feroculus ,  756,  D  ;  Varro  is  authority  for  hilaresco,  819, 
B,  subulcus,  740,  F,  undulatus  (thorax),  644,  B.  Casern,  in  the  sense  of  senex^ 
420,  C,  and  another  early  Latin  word  vitilitigator,  402,  occur.  From  Lucretius 
again  we  \i2i\ t  gravatim,  446,  A  ;  while  Catullus  supplies  erudiiulus,  835,  E,  and 
hificetiae.  There  are  many  words  peculiar  to  Terence  in  the  Colloquies,  cadaver- 
osus,  432,  B  ;  incogitans  (later  in  Ausonius),  434,  D;  deambulatio,  697,  D; 
expiscor,  651,  D;  grandiusculus,  653,  F;  prodeambulo,  635,  D.  Plautus  is 
drawn  upon  still  more  freely,  alliahan,  717,  B;  basilicus,  632,  C  ;  agoranomuSy 
788,  F;  cenaticus,  as  an  adjective,  661,  B  ;  congerro,  635,  D,  et  passim  ;  incogi- 
tantia,  414,  B ;  ntendicabulum,  786,  D  ;  oenopolium,  648,  F ;  pancratice  and 
athleiice,  631,  B;  poly??iachaeroplacidae,  823,  E;  stuliesco,  415,  B;  suffuy-or^ 
777,  B  ;  surrepticius y  794,  E ;  hisculum,  453,  B;  and  vidulus,  494,  C,  which 
last  is  a  woid  that  appears  later  in  the  Vulgate. 

Passing  over  the  classical  writers,  merely  pausing  to  remark  that  the  rare 
words  from  this  period  are  frequently  diminutives  again,  such  as  cornicula,  798, 
D,  407,  A,  from  Horace  ;  unciola,  Zi'j,  F,  418,  B,  from  Juvenal ;  leviusailus, 
from  Pliny,  882,  B,  and  imaguncula,  781,  B,  from  Suetonius,  we  come  to  those 
writers  whose  works  are  strongly  tinged  with  plebeian  Latinity.  In  Petronius  we 
find  the  adverb  blandum,  837,  B ;  catastrophe ,  678,  F,  785,  B  ;  and  pharmacus^ 
which  means  an  apothecary  in  later  Latin,  however.  Apuleius  perhaps  intro- 
duced more  plebeian  words  than  any  other  pagan  writer  which  took  root  in  the 
literary  Latin  of  the  Middle  Ages  and  survived  the  pruning  process  that  took  place 
at  the  time  of  the  Renaissance.  To  him  are  due  byssus,  a  cotton  or  linen  cloth, 
also  mentioned  in  the  Vulgate,  825,  A;  cantillo,  721,  B;  capillituim,  472,  A; 
circumtortus,  83 1,  D  ;  dissitus,  752,  A;  exercitamentum,  648,  D;  fastidienter, 
501,  C;  foliola,  864,  B  ;  inabsolutus,  776,  F;  infaniuius,  714,  A;  768,  C  (also 
infantula^  698,  ]^)  ;  interula  (sc.  tunica'),  743,  B  ;  laniena,  butchery,  775,  C  ; 
nugamenta,  459,  A;  sebaceus,  a  tallow  dip^  713,  D;  seniculus,  738,  F,  786,  D  ; 
ultramtindaneus,  467,  A  ;  viaticulum,  736,  E.  In  addition  to  other  words  Gellius 
is  authority  for  bibax,  659,  D,  and  linguax,  645,  E,  et  passim  i^petax  comes  from 
a  late  grammarian,  649,  E) ;  and  also  locutuleius,  850,  E,  something  like  Cicero's 
leguleius.  Two  compounds  with  sub  come  from  Ammianus,  submoestus,  704,  A, 
and  subordoror,  754,  E.  The  Corpus  Juris  contributed  a  nvunber  of  words  to 
New  Latin  through  the  medium  of  the  jurists.  We  find  in  the  Colloquies  and 
Encofnium,  criminaliter,  797,  D;  deipara,  445,  C;  exorcista,  751,  C;  expositio 
(exposure  of  an  infant),  767,  C  ;  manuaria,  686,  D  ;  nativitas  (also  in  Vulgate 
and  Tertulian),  729,  D  ;  orthodoxus,  732,  C  ;  pelliceus,  736,  F  ;  pharmacum,  421, 
F;  repubesco,  415,  B;  venditrix,  772,  D. 

The  above  lists,  especially  in  case  of  those  words  that  date  back  to  the  Roman 
period,  must  be  taken  as  representative  rather  than  exhaustive.  They  are  suffi- 
cient, however,  to  show  this  :  that  Erasmus,  who  was  the  man  of  letters  par  ex- 
cellence of  his  generation,  and  whose  works  have  exercised  a  greater  positive  influ- 
ence upon  his  own  times  and  subsequent  literature  than  those  of  any  other  New 
Latin  author,  although  he  was  a  humanist,  was  just  as  far  from  being  a  purist  so 
far  as  vocabulary  was  concerned  as  were  the  schoolmen  who  preceded  the  Revival 


98  MEDIEVAL   AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

of  Learning.  Not  only  this  ;  but  it  was  vulgar  Latin  that  determined  the  color  of 
his  style.  Of  course  this  was  due  in  great  part  to  the  influence  of  Christian  liter- 
ature ;  but  it  is  indicated  not  only  by  direct  contributions  of  words  and  phrases, 
though  these  are  nvunerous,  but  also  by  a  linguistic  taste  that  led  Erasmus  to  coin 
new  words  after  the  form  and  fashion  of  plebeian  rather  than  of  classical  Latin, 
and  by  a  preference  for  diminutives  and  derivatives  that  is  apparent  in  all  his 
Latin  writings.  Of  course  the  Colloquies,  where  he  is  painting  every  day  life,  af- 
ford us  more  examples  of  non-classical  formations  than  his  other  works  ;  but  even 
in  translations  from  pagan  authors,  from  Lucian  for  instance,  Erasman  words  are 
not  infrequent.  In  a  few  pages  taken  at  random  in  tke  first  volume  of  his  com- 
plete works,  all  of  them  from  Lucian,  we  find  the  following  :  moniiugarum 
rerum,  252,  E ;  inidoneuSy  220,  F  ;  insultus,  attack,  224,  C  ;  defensa  ulum,  264, 
A;  diluculariusy  264,  F;  iurgiter,  301,  B. 

While  Erasmus  frequently  uses  diminutives,  frequentatives  and  compounds 
with  discrimination,  and  employs  the  modified  forms  to  express  more  exactly  a 
finer  shade  of  meaning,  it  is  not  safe  to  presume  upon  this  in  all  instances  where  the 
derived  forms  are  used.  Corpiisculiim  occurs  passim  for  corpus  in  the  Colloquies. 
Where  we  have  an  instance  of  the  discriminating  use  of  a  compound,  as  ^^Vos 
certastis,  at  non  decertastis,  727,  F,  it  can  be  matched  by  such  irregular  uses  as, 
cum  pidmn  Jlorem  cuvi  vivo  decertantem  videmus,  674,  E,  or,  coccyx  et  luscinia  in- 
ter se  canendi  gloria  decertantes ,  727,  A.  DestertOy  702,  D,  has  the  directly  op- 
posite meaning  to  that  given  to  it  by  Perseus.  In  the  description  of  almost  exactly 
parallel  situations,  761,  A,  and  762,  B,  clamito  is  used  in  the  first  instance  and 
clamo  in  the  second. 

Erasmus  has  certain  favorite  words  and  expressions  that  are  so  common  as 
almost  to  characterize  his  prose.  Such  are  divino,  surmise,  think,  and  divinatio  ; 
religio  in  the  sense  of  a  religious  scruple  or  matter  of  principle ;  partes,  partes 
agere,  nostrae partes, primas partes,  etc.;  usu  vaiire,  to  occur;  blandior  and  its 
compounds  and  derivatives  in  the  greatest  variety  of  significations.  Blandum  and 
blande,  810,  F,  both  occur  as  adverbs  ;  and  blanditur  is  used  impersonally  for 
"  It  is  a  pleasant  day."  Frigeo  in  its  figurative  sense  of  languish,  be  at  a  stand- 
still, is  common,  and  wrath  is  usually  indicated  by  one  of  the  compounds  of  can- 
deo,  incandesco,  excandesco.  Erasmus'  critics  called  him  porrophagiis  on  account 
of  his  frequent  use  of  that  word,  and  immo  is  a  particle  that  stands  in  equal  favor 
with  him.  Facinus  with  its  Plautan  meaning  of  * '  thing ' '  occurs  occasionally, 
QXi6.  fabula  is  used  at  least  once  in  the  same  general  sense, — puella,  maxima  huius 
fabtilae  pars,  488,  A — a  little  like  the  colloquial  use  sometimes  made  of  the  Ger- 
man word  geschichte.  Citra  and  absque  are  frequently  used  for  sine.  luxta  is 
employed  more  freely  and  designates  a  rather  wider  range  of  relations  than  is 
usual  in  classical  Latin. 

The  orthography  of  a  Latin  writer  of  this  period  need  not  detain  us  long,  as  it 
was  entirely  traditional  and  gives  very  little  clue  to  the  phonetic  history  of  that 
language  or  of  the  vernacular.  The  question  of  spelling  was  a  relatively  impor- 
tant one  in  the  Middle  Ages,  when  the  manuscript  transmission  of  past  knowledge 
was  the  principal  function  of  letters.  Bede  and,  as  we  have  seen,  Alcuin,  wrote 
works  upon  the  subject.  At  the  time  of  the  Renaissance  the  revival  of  classical 
Latin  led  to  a  sympathetic  attempt  to  restore  classical  orthography.     Old  manu- 


LATIN    OF   THE   RENAISSANCE.  99 

scripts  and  inscriptions  were  cited  as  authority  for  many  changes,  or  rather  for  the 
final  selection  and  uniform  use  of  one  of  the  several  doubtful  forms  of  a  word. 
But  it  was  long  before  usage  became  definitely  settled,  and  the  question  of  pho- 
netic reform  was  a  source  of  frequent  discussion  and  dispute  among  the  humanists. 
Absolute  uniformity  had  not  been  secured  even  by  Erasmus'  time.  He  spells  la- 
crimae  as  we  do  to-day  in  most  cases  ;  but  still  we  find  lacryntaSy  483,  B  ;  and 
some  editions  have  lachrimas,  446,  B.  Braveum^  647,  B,  and  Brabeutn,  761, 
B,  are  both  found  in  the  Colloquies.  The  following  points  may  be  worth  noting 
also,  as  having  some  bearing  upon  sixteenth  century  philology. 

( 1 )  The  distinction  between  the  long  vowels  and  the  diphthongs  is  not  closely 
drawn  in  all  cases.  Ae  takes  the  place  of  e  occasionally,  collosaeus,  781,  C  ;  ef- 
fraemiSy  851,  B  ;  laeves,  418,  D  ;  the  reverse  is  seen  in  pene,  480,  A.  Ei  takes 
the  place  of  e, — omneis,  passim,  treis,  460,  A ;  mortaleis,  463,  D.  Heic  is  the 
regular  form  for  the  adverb  in  Erasmus. 

(2)  The  irregular  use  or  omission  of  the  aspirate  is  common.  The  cases 
where  it  is  most  noticeable  are  cors,  which  occurs  regularly  for  cohors,  and  charus 
and  charitas,  for  cams  and  caritas.    This  last  is  probably  due  to  Greek  influence. 

(3)  Other  irregularities  have  hardly  disappeared  from  Latin  at  the  present  day. 
There  is  uncertainty  about  double  consonants  ;  caussa  and  caussor  are  the  usual 
forms  ;  comimis  occurs,  427,  C  ;  and  other  examples  of  this  sort  might  be  given. 
We  generally  find  c  for  /  before  i  followed  by  another  vowel  in  Erasmus,  but  this  is 
not  invariably  so  ;  e.  g.,  negociator,  444,  B;  but  negotium,  691,  A.  Ipstis  for 
ipse,  774,  C,  is  probably  a  reminiscence  of  Plautus. 

By  Erasmus'  time  the  best  writers  were  seldom  guilty  of  gross  errors  of  syntax  ; 
in  fact  their  works  often  approached  much  nearer  to  classical  perfection  in  this  re- 
spect than  do  those  of  a  period  but  slightly  removed  from  the  Augustan  age.  As 
Erasmus  was  not  a  Ciceronian,  however,  he  drew  his  construction,  like  his  vocab- 
ulary, from  a  wide  range  of  writers.  Occasionally  an  isolated  instance  of  a 
solecism — for  example,  a  nemine,  470,  C  ,  for  which,  however,  he  might  plead 
the  authority  of  Tacitus — creeps  into  his  works  ;  but  there  is  very  seldom  a  com- 
bination of  words  in  his  writings  thart:  could  not  be  justified  by  an  appeal  to  good 
Roman  usage.  The  variety  of  construction  in  Erasmus  is  very  great.  He  did 
about  everything  with  his  words  that  the  traditions  of  the  language  allowed  ;  but 
he  very  seldom  overstepped  the  bounds  which  those  traditions  set.  In  his  syntax, 
as  in  his  theology,  he  was  a  liberal  ;  but  he  always  intended  to  be  orthodox. 

As  it  would  not  be  particularly  profitable  to  assemble  here  a  large  number  of 
familiar  syntactical  forms,  we  shall  content  ourselves  with  mentioning  one  or  two 
that  are  interesting  either  because  they  are  uncommon,  or  because  they  are  in  a 
sense  favorites  with  Erasmus,  and  employed  by  him  so  often  as  to  affect  the  color 
of  his  literary  style. 

Like  many  a  modern  English  author,  Erasmus  often  wrote  under  the  shadow 
of  a  classical  model,  and  this  model  varied  somewhat  with  the  character  of  the 
work  which  he  was  writing.  In  the  Colloquies  and  the  Encomium  Moriae  we  see 
abundant  evidence  of  the  influence  of  the  comic  writers.  This  is  shown  not  only 
by  occasional  centos  and  allusions,  and  by  frequent  instances  of  ellipsis,  especially 
in  such  colloquial  expressions  as  Quid  multa  ?  Quid  multis  (so.  verbis  ofus)  ? 
Qui  sic  ?  Quid  ita  ?,  but  also  by  the  recurrence  of  constructions  often  found  in 


lOO  MEDIEVAL   AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

Plautus  and  Terence  and  not  common  in  other  writers.  The  appositional  genitive 
occurs  frequently  in  such  expressions  as  delicias  hominis,  644,  A,  nugamentum 
hominis,  645,  F,  somnium  ho?mnis,  643,  C,  syphar  hominis,  862,  D,  and  with 
almost  partitive  force  in  vulgiis  hominum,  682,  F  el  passim  ;  vulgus  oratorum,  407, 
B.  In  place  of  the  partitive  genitive  we  have  genus  in  the  appositional  relation, 
hoc  genus  ho?ni7tibus,  722,  D  ;  hoc  genus  oblectamentis,  410,  E;  id  genus  deorum, 
409,  C  ;  id  genus  mulia,  482,  E ;  id  genus  labores,  483,  B.  Such  instances  of 
adverbial  comparison  occur  as,  abunde  magnum,  441,  D  ;  minime  mendax,  408, 
B  ;  vehementer  obesae,  761,  C  ;  oppido  sacrum,  781,  A  ;  oppido  salutaris,  496,  A. 
Omnissimum,  798,  A,  w^as  doubtless  suggested  by  Plautus'  ipsissimus.  Other 
expressions  that  suggest  the  Latin  of  daily  life  are  pulchre  noverant,  828,  A,  and 
the  middle  use  of  habeo,  coepit  habere  meliuscule,  802,  B.  Tafitum  non  ene- 
cabar,  775,  B,  is  probably  a  popular  rather  than  a  literary  construction. 

Prepositions  are  used  with  their  classical  force  and  signification,  and  we  see  no 
tendency  to  employ  them  where  a  case  ending  satisfactorily  expresses  a  relation. 
Classical  official  usage  affords  the  analogy  for  such  expressions  as  esse  a  secretis, 
462,  C  ;  nomina  episcoporzim  a  stiff ragiis,  780,  A  ;  tales  a  poculis  {^tales pocillatores), 
717,  A;  manum  angeli  qui  est  Virgini  ab  epistolis,  775,  A.  The  proper  names 
Harpalus  a  Como,  and  Comes  a  Nassauen,  835,  A  and  B,  are  of  course  used  in 
professed  imitation  of  mediaeval  custom.  Ad  is  used  occasionally  to  express  com- 
parison, ceteras  teliquias  nihil  esse  ad  tarn  sacrum  lac,  779,  D.  Philosopher  is 
used  as  a  transitive,  dtwi  nubes  et  ideas  philosophatur,  423,  A,  and  occino  is  simi- 
larly used  on  two  occasions,  occino  encomium,  642,  C,  and  occino  cantionem,  695, 
D.  Huius  facio  sapientes  is  a  construction  justified  only  through  analogy  by  clas- 
sical usage,  and  we  sometimes,  though  very  rarely,  find  instances  of  loose  con- 
struction, Vulgus  hominutn  existimat  se  non  frustra  vixisse,  si  per  fas  nefasque 
congestas  divitias  relinquant  morientes,  682,  F  ;  and,  nonne  eodem  fere  pertinet, 
cum  singulae  regiones  suufn  aliquem  peculiarem  vindicaut  divum  ?  445,  C  ;  where 
we  apparently  have  a  substantive  clause  in  the  indicative  introduced  by  ctim. 

It  is  hardly  necessary  to  say  more  about  Erasmus'  syntax.  It  harmonizes  with 
his  vocabulary,  leaning,  in  the  Colloquies  at  least,  decidedly  more  to  the  simple 
construction  of  the  comic  writers  and  plebeian  Latin  than  to  the  more  elaborate 
periodic  structure  of  the  Roman  orators  arid  historians.  Renaissance  syntax  is 
artificial  to  this  extent,  that  it  does  not  indicate  anything  as  to  the  organic  de- 
velopment of  the  language.  Its  validity  rests  upon  the  authority  of  previous 
authors  rather  than  upon  colloquial  usage  ;  and  to  those  authors  we  naturally  go 
for  original  information  about  the  constructions  found  in  their  works.  The  sim- 
plicity of  Erasmus'  syntax  is  a  matter  of  style  rather  than  of  grammar  ;  it  is  a  per- 
sonal element,  not  something  acquired  in  schools.  He  was  naturally  more  French 
than  German  in  his  way  of  thinking  and  of  expressing  himself.  The  involved 
sentence  did  not  fit  his  mind.  The  elements  of  his  sentences  as  a  rule  follow  each 
other  in  the  logical  order,  the  predicate  in  the  middle.^ 

When  we  come  to  the  question  of  style  piue  and  simple,  we  are  upon  ground 

*//  tCest  pas  excessif  de  dire  que  le  style  d' Erasine,  dans  ses  Lettres  surtout  a  d^j'a 
commeun  air  defantille  aziec  le  langue  rapide  de  notre  dix  huitiejne  siecle/rancais,  et  I'un 
pent  conclure  avec  certitude  qu'il a  dH  a  la  forme  hezireuse  et  nette  qu'il  salt  donner  a  sa 
pensee  une  grande  partle  de  son  influence  litteraire.     Feugere,  o.  c  ,  443. 


LATIN    OF   THE   RENAISSANCE.  lOI 

where  originality  has  full  play.  Except  possibly  in  case  of  some  extreme  Cice- 
ronians,  the  style  of  one  Renaissance  writer  is  not  that  of  any  other  ;  nor  is  it 
easily  to  be  mistaken  for  that  of  a  classical  author.  Some  of  the  Ciceronians  did 
acquire  a  style  that  was  very  evidently  an  imitation  of  Cicero's  ;  but  even  then 
they  established  their  individuality  in  their  works  by  the  degree  of  perfection  that 
they  attained  in  this  imitation.  The  same  is  true  of  the  Florentine  historians, 
who  wrote  with  I.ivy  for  a  model.  Erasmus'  Latin  is  quite  different  from  this. 
It  is  as  individual  as  is  Voltaire's  French  or  Sterne's  English.  It  is  as  much  his 
own  as  the  contents  of  the  works  themselves.  Moreover,  within  the  bounds  which 
personality  sets,  it  varies  somewhat  with  his  different  writings,  adapting  itself  to 
the  character  of  the  subject.  Stultitia,  in  the  Encomium  Moriae^  is  represented 
as  a  woman,  and  she  pleads  her  cause  with  feminine  volubility,  seldom  ending 
her  sentences  until  she  is  out  of  breath,  abounding  in  asyndeton  and  ellipsis, 
stringing  word  upon  word  in  vagrant,  never-ending  categories  that  sometimes  seem 
to  include  everything  in  heaven  and  on  earth  and  in  the  regions  beneath  the  earth. 
In  the  Colloquies  characters  from  all  the  walks  of  life  appear,  prince  sand  bishops, 
merchants  and  craftsmen,  pious  pilgrims  and  vagabond  charlatans,  monks  and 
gallants,  noble  dames  and  jolly  goodwives,  nuns  and  courtesans,  old  men  at  their 
gossip  and  young  boys  at  their  games — all  speaking  ex  personis  with  the  language 
appropriate  to  their  respective  callings  and  conditions.  It  is  evident  therefore  that 
a  study  of  style  based  exclusively  upon  these  two  works  cannot  be  fairly  repre- 
sentative of  Erasmus.  They  are  characterized  by  those  figures  of  syntax  that  are 
common  in  every  day  conversation.  They  seldom  give  opportunity  to  employ  the 
grand  style  in  writing  affected  by  the  humanists  in  those  forgotten  panegyrics  and 
orations  upon  which  they  based  their  literary  reputation  and  their  hopes  of  lasting 
fame.  Erasmus  could  write  works  of  this  sort  if  he  tried  :  it  was  largely  a  matter 
of  practice.  But  he  really  preferred  a  Dutch  interior  to  an  Italian  fresco.  So  that 
while  from  the  point  of  view  of  mere  Latinity,  of  purity  and  correctness  of  style 
alone,  the  Colloquies  and  the  Encomium  Moriae  do  not  represent  Erasmus  at  his 
best,  they  are  the  works  which  are  most  strictly  Erasman,  the  ones  that  first  occur 
to  us  when  his  name  is  mentioned  ;  and  even  from  the  linguistic  standpoint  they 
are  those  of  most  interest  to  us,  because  in  language  as  well  as  in  form  and  con- 
tent they  are  probably  the  most  original  masterpieces  of  New  Latin  literature. 

To  return  to  matters  of  detail,  an  exhaustive  complication  of  all  the  figures  in 
these  two  works  would  form  a  book  of  itself.  A  few  illustrations  from  fairly  repre- 
sentative examples  will  serve  our  purpose  here.  We  have  already  mentioned  the 
frequency  of  ellipsis.  In  case  oi pars  it  occurs  dSitx primes,  primas  tenet  sapientia, 
845,  D  ;  after  virili,  pro  men  viriliy  636,  D  et passim  ;  with  cetera, pennis  cetera 
nigris,  690,  F.  Bora  is  omitted  after  the  numerals  in  such  phrases  as  ad  quintamy 
649,  C  et  passim.  Ars  is  omitted  after  sutoria,  684,  D  ;  alcumistica,  752,  F  ; 
chiromantica,  lyj,  D.  Similarly  recta  (so.  via)^  823,  B,  and  z//// (sc.  pretio)^ 
716,  B,  occur,  Ut  IS  omitted  after  oportet,  ponat  oportet,  41 1,  D  ;  facial  oportet, 
822,  A  ;  faciOy  fac  adsis,  660,  A ;  fac  merere,  824,  C ;  rogo,  rogo  iubeas,  764,  E. 
Asyndeton  is  so  common  in  all  Erasmus'  works  as  to  be  a  characteristic  feature 
of  his  style.  Such  examples  of  the  omissions  of  conjunctions  between  words  as, 
cuizts  arbitrio  bella,  paces,  imperia,  consilia,  iudicia,  comitia,  connubia,  pacta, 
foedera,  leges,  artes,  ludicria,  seria,  etc. — administrantur,  409,  C  ;  and  between 


I02  MEDIEVAL    AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

sentences,  Tolle  hoc  vitae  condimentum,  et  frigebit  cum  sua  actione  orator,  fiulli 
placebit  cum  suis  numeris  musicus,  explodetur  cum  sua  gesticulatione  histrio,  ride- 
bitur  una  cum  suis  Musis  pacta,  sordebit  cum  sua  arte  pictor,  esuriet  cum  pharma- 
cis  medicus,  421,  E,  occur  very  frequently.  We  might  mention  here  obiter  that  it 
is  a  favorite  device  with  Erasmus — one  of  the  simple  constructions  that  come  down 
from  plebeian  Latin  and  the  Vulgate — to  substitute  an  imperative  for  a  prepositive 
conditional  sentence. 

Instances  of  brachyology  are  common  :  linguam  audivimus,  sed  ego  metuebam 
tibia  manibus,  721,  C;  exorietur  autem  repente  nova  rerum  species  ut  qui  modo 
mulier,  nunc  vir ;  qui  modo  iuvenis,  mox  senex,  etc.,  428,  C.  Ennalage  and 
chiasmus  occur  less  frequently.  Hos  vetustas  credidit,  712,  C  ;  and  musto  ficisque 
recentibus  agricolarum  lascivia  consueverit  oblinere,  4 1 6,  A,  are  examples  of  the 
former,  while  in  the  Encomium,  422,  D,  Demosthenes  is  characterized  as  tarn 
ignavus  miles  quam  orator  sapiens. 
.  While  rhetorical  figures  are  not  forced  or  affected  in  Erasmus'  writings,  they 
'  are  very  common.  He  compiled  a  collection  of  similes,  and  attributes  to  such 
figures  non  nitorem  modo,  sed  universam  prope  sermonis  dignitatem.  An  example 
or  two  from  many  will  suffice,  as  they  are  rather  formal  in  any  case  :  pfincipem — 
qui  vel,  seu  sidus  salutare,  morum  innocentia  maximam  rebus  humanis  salutem 
possit  afferre,  vel,  veluti  cometa  letialis,  summam  perniciem  invehere,  47  9  >  C.  We 
are  tempted  to  add  one  more  likeness  bearing  upon  the  same  subject,  partly  be- 
cause it  illustrates  Erasmus'  position  with  reference  to  the  final  source  of  kingly 
authority,  and  also  because  it  is  borrowed  apparently  from  a  mediaeval  work,  De 
Regimine  principis,  usually  attributed  to  Aquinas.  Erasmus  owes  no  small  debt 
to  the  political  teachings  of  the  scholastic  philosophy.  This  quotation  occurs  in 
the  Convivium  Fabulosum,  762,  C ;  quod  enim  animus  est  corpori,  hoc  est  bonus 
prin  eps  reipublicae.  Quid  opus  erat  addere  ^  bonus, ^  quando  malus  princeps  non 
est  princeps  ;  quern  ad  modum  spiritus  impurus  qui  invasit  corpus  hominis  non  est 
anitmis. 

Metaphor,  however,  is  the  most  important  and  the  most  common  of  all  figures 
I  in  Erasmus'  writings.  He  uses  it  not  only  in  the  conventional  way,  to  embellish 
'  and  ornament,  or  to  add  force  and  precision  to  a  paragraph.  He  recurs  to  it  with 
the  instinct  of  a  language  maker,  to  add  the  copiousness  and  variety  of  his  vocab- 
ulary, until  the  language  becomes  plastic  and  vital  in  his  hands.  Of  course, 
Erasmus  was  not  always  equally  happy  in  hitting  upon  a  latent  synonym  to  ex- 
press his  thought,  and  he  sometimes  employed  metaphors  that  had  already  become 
conventional ;  but  the  effect  upon  the  whole  was  doubtless  to  add  much  vigor  and 
freshness  to  his  language.  The  following  examples  are  representative.  They 
contain  the  misses  as  well  as  the  hits.  Aestatis  incendium,  789,  B  ;  aegrotat  cru- 
menu,  632,  B  ;  mussant  civitates.  (This  suggests,  by  way  of  contrast,  a  curiously 
pompous  sentence  used  by  Sidonius  in  a  similar  connection,  Ep.  I,  2,  2  :  Mussitat 
quidem  iuvenum  nostrorum  calcata  generositas),  759,  C;  palatu?n  obsurduerat, 
661,  C;  incrudescit  tempestas,  712,  D;  incrudescit  rixa,  702,  E;  mali  novum 
genus,  cuius  matrem  ego  hisce  manibus  consevi,  667,  A,  and,  yfa — modo  decerptos 
a  matre,  721,  D;  culinae  regina,  841,  E,  and  culinae  praefecta,  673,  A,  are 
rather  suggestive  ;  epilogus  and  proemium  convivii,  819,  A;  apum  regnum,  676, 
1^',  politiafji  formicarum,    675,    D;  sarcio  for   emendo,  passim ;  nubeculae   for 


LATIN    OF   THE    RENAISSANCE.  IO3 

initia  irarttm,  703,  B ;  alvearia  for  monasteria,  823,  C  ;  fiosculorum  stellulae^ 
690,  E  ;  lixivium  lacrimarum,  882,  F  ;  frons  for  pudor^  minimum  esse  frontis, 
643,  A  ;  alea  iox  fortuna  or  periculum^  641,  A  and  B  ;  ventris  suburra,  '  a  stay 
for  the  stomach,'  648,  B  ;  columna  ecclesiae,  801,  E  ;  matrimonii  nassa,  837,  B  ; 
promicare^  to  spring  forward,  715,  D;  and,  euphemistically,  colloquium  for  con- 
gressus,  ante  nuptias  fuit  mihi  cum  eo  colloquium^  707,  A.  The  familiar,  provin- 
ciam  detrectare,  dTJ,  D,  recipere,  638,  B,  and  suseipere,  724,  A,  are  used,  like 
partes  agere,  as  idioms  ;  and  more  formal  metaphors,  such  as  in  deorum  senatum, 
411,  D,  agmen  morborutn,  805,  E,  and  quot  agviina  morborum  infestent?  431,  A; 
bonorum  pelagus,  483,  B,  and  superstitionum  pelagus  ingredior,  446,  A ;  mare 
fabularum  aperuisti,  765,  C,  occur  frequently. 

Metonomy  is  also  a  favorite  figure  with  Erasmus.  As  a  rule,  however,  it  is 
exceedingly  conventional  :  Apolline  nullo,  721,  F;  Chrysippum  agere,  661,  D; 
irata  Delia,  633,  E  ;  favet  Delia,  738,  A  ;  Epicureos  agere,  660,  A  ;  Hercule 
dextro,  452,  B  ;  736,  C  ;  Herculem  praestare,  660,  F;  meo  Marte  gessi,  733,  D  ; 
Marie  suo  vincere,  647,  E ;  Mercurio  dextro,  824,  C  ;  Mercurio  favente,  761,  E, 
824,  A  ;  Mercurio  bene  fortunante,  736,  C  ;  invita  Minerva,  859,  D  ;  crassa  Mi- 
nerija,  832,  D,  873,  B  ;  pingui  Minerva,  420,  A,  428,  B,  772,  D  ;  reluctante  Mi- 
nerva, 418,  C;  ni  prorsus  repugnat  Minerva,  860,  A  ;  Mitionem  praebere,  662, 
F,  and  agere,  734,  B  ;  Nestorem  praestare,  747,  C  ;  adhibitis  Nymphis  (so.  aqua')^ 
662,  A  ;  Silenum  agere,  803,  B  ;  Deitieae  sunt,  629,  A,  662,  F.* 

The  metonomy  is  often  embodied  in  an  epithet  :  Achillea  argumenta,  693, 
C;  Alcedojiia  (sc.  tempo>-a),  834,  C;  schola  Catiana,  662,  C;  Chrysippeae  sub- 
tilitates,  467,  B  ;  Democriticas  fabulas,  877,  D  ;  Diogenica,  Platonica,  Pytha- 
gorica  cena,  659,  E ;  Epicurea  vita,  641,  A ;  833,  C  ;  gladiatoria  Jirmitas, 
832,  F,  and  latera,  751,  B;  Gorgonei  oculi,  784,  D;  cenationes  Lucullianae, 
684,  F;  tirbem  Mercurialem,  863,  A ;  Nestorea  senecta,  43 1,  C;  Saguntina 
fames,  787,  E  ;  7-isum  Sardonictan,  721,  B  ;  Scythica  concio,  712,  D  ;  Scythicum 
convivium,  765,  F  ;  prandium  Sybaritum,  Carmelitum,  680,  B ;  Thrasonica 
stultitia,  742,  A  ;  Thrasonica  omnia,  822,  C  ;  eine  Thrasoni  ?  827,  C  ;  Homer- 
ica  mendacia,  796,  B. 

Alliteration  and  homoeuteleuton  occur  frequently  in  an  accidental,  unconscious 
way ;  but  it  is  seldom  that  they  are  used  intentionally.  Such  instances  are,  per- 
haps, sensim  spiritus  et  succum,  415,  A;  si  pergam  popularium  stultitiarum  et  in- 
saniartnn  formas  enumerare,  457,  A  ;  and,  without  doubt,  bella  bellaria,  825,  C, 
and  864,  D.  In  the  verses  of  the  Epithalimum,  748,  D,  E,  F,  there  are  several 
alliterative  verses,  one  distich  in  particular  having  a  line  that  is  artificially  so  : 

Ilia  caritate  superet  coniugum  Admeti  ducis. 
Quae  volens  mortem  mariti  morte  mutavit  sua. 

Erasmus  sometimes  trifles  with  his  words,  subtillisimas  subtilitates  subtiliores  red- 
diint,  etc.,  465,  C,  and  he  not  infrequently  descends  to  a  pun.     Alea  and  Malea 

*  The  remarkably  frequent  use  of  such  figures  as  those  contained  in  this  and  more  especially 
in  the  following  paragraph  is  doubtless  due  in  part  to  a  persistence  of  the  mediaeval  habit  of  con- 
sidering great  historical  characters  as  personifications  of  a  particular  virtue  or  vice,  as  is  illustrated 
in  the  development  of  the  morality  plays,  or  in  such  expressions  as/aia  Neronizant,  Neronior 
Platonior,  Salotnonior ,  in  the  elegies  of  Henricus  Septimellensis. 


I04  MEDIEVAL   AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

are  associated  in  this  way  several  times,  e.  g, — 736,  C ;  other  examples  are  : 
Apud  Hibernos  igitur  hibernasti  ?  736,  E  ;  quae  Romanam  sedem  onerat — lapsa 
sum,  honorat,  483,  C  ;  neque  quisquani  illoruni  Graeculos  istos  pluris  facit  quam 
graculos,  491,  D  ;  Sorbonam,  ubi  bene  sorbetur^  666,  B  ;  Miser,  quat?i  penitus 
oculos  tuos  obsedit  oGndTOQ — i.  e.,  Scotus,  747,' A.  There  is  a  spice  of  malice 
about  these  that  relieves  the  puerility  of  the  device. 

Renaissance  Latin  is  usually  characterized  by  a  certain  uniformity,  almost  a 
monotony  of  tone  and  color,  due  largely  to  the  fact  that  its  forms  of  expression  and 
literary  apparatus  in  general  were  drawn  from  a  comparatively  limited  field  and 
one  already  familiar  to  us.  Even  when  an  author  tries  to  be  original,  and  faith- 
fully to  represent  the  spirit  of  his  time,  he  never  can  quite  conceal  the  fact  that  his 
small-clothes  have  been  cut  out  of  a  toga.  One  sometimes  feels  in  reading  works 
of  this  period,  as  if  he  were  at  a  masquerade,  where  his  fancy  is  often  tickled  by 
recognizing  a  familiar  character  from  literature  or  history,  but  where  he  would 
like  occasionally  to  lay  aside  the  masks  and  come  face  to  face  with  the  impersona- 
tors themselves.  Like  the  authors  in  Irving' s  dream,  the  writers  are  tricked  out 
with  the  fiinery  of  a  former  generation,  a  wig  from  this  one  and  a  cloak  from  that, 
only  in  this  case  there  is  no  intention  of  deceiving,  but  like  children  trooping  down 
from  the  attic  at  a  holiday  reunion,  they  parade  their  spoils  ostentatiously,  and  each 
seems  to  feel  that  he  has  assumed  with  them  something  of  the  glory  and  romance  of  a 
half- forgotten  age.  By  Erasmus'  time,  however,  this  innocent  plagiarism  had  be- 
come to  a  large  extent  unconscious.  Centos  had  become  idioms  of  the  literary  lan- 
guage, which  he  handles  much  as  we  do  those  conventional  phrases  that  our  modem 
writers  repeat  a  score  of  times  in  every  dozen  pages.  When  Erasmus  has  occasion 
to  refer  to  the  pleasure  that  men  take  in  recalling  past  trials  and  the  difficulties 
that  they  have  overcome,  for  instance,  the  form  in  which  he  expresses  the  thought 
is  determined,  probably  in  a  sort  of  automatic  way,  by  Vergil's  et  haec  olim  for- 
tasse  me7ninisse  iuvabit.  He  does  not  quote  these  words ;  they  are  used  rather 
with  the  freedom  of  a  proverb.  So  he  says  in  the  Colloquies,  incundum  est  memi- 
nisse  laborum  actorum,  639,  B  ;  iucundi  sunt  adi  labores,  712,  B  ;  ante  actorum 
laborum  iucunda  recordatio,  8 1 9,  C  ;  or,  actorum  laborum  solet  esse  iucunda  com- 
memoratio,  862,  E.  It  probably  would  have  been  very  unconventional,  and 
have  smacked  of  literary  heresy,  to  have  gone  beyond  the  dictum  of  the  master  in 
a  case  like  this. 

Closely  allied  with  expressions  of  this  sort  are  the  proverbs  which  one  would 
naturally  expect  to  be  common  in  the  writings  of  the  author  of  the  Adages,  es- 
pecially in  a  work  like  the  Colloquies,  where  the  conversational  form  gives  ample 
opportunity  for  the  introduction  of  pithy  apothegms  and  folk-sayings.  This  ex- 
pectation is  not  disappointed,  as  the  examples  [given  below  will  sufficiently 
testify. 

One  might  indulge  in  some  interesting  speculations  in  connection  with  proverbs 
as  to  why  that  humble  and  unassuming  immigrant  from  Asia,  the  ass,  should 
have  secured  such  an  important  position  in  European  literature,  especially  in  the 
sayings  of  the  common  people.  His  literary  biography  remains  to  be  written  ;  but 
when  it  is,  it  will  form  an  interesting  chapter  in  the  history  of  European  letters. 
Like  his  Latin  isonym  he  would  need  a  Budaeus  perhaps  to  do  him  justice. 
The  pig  seems  to  have  been  the  only  animal  that  competed  with  him  in  the  favor 


XJNIVERSn 


LATIN    OF   THE    RENAISSANCE.  I05 

of  the  Romans  ;  in  the  Middle  Ages  he  was  raised  to  the  dignity  of  an  epic  hero  ; 
and  by  the  time  of  Poggio  he  figured  without  a  rival  as  the  most  prominent  quad- 
ruped in  facetious  anecdotes.  With  Erasmus  he  is  decidedly  a  favorite.  Asinus 
is  quite  classical,  in  fact  Ciceronian,  for  a  blockhead,  and  while  the  adjective 
asininus  with  the  precise  signification  of  stupid — the  sense  with  which  Erasmus 
uses  it  in  the  Encomium — does  not  occur  in  the  classical  writings  preserved  to  us, 
we  can  safely  assume  that  that  meaning  was  one  familiar  to  the  Romans.  In- 
versus Apuleuis  occurs  for  asinus  twice,  729,  E;  851,  E,  and  proverbs  and 
allusions  of  the  following  character  are  found  in  the  works  to  which  we  refer : 
non  credo  volare  asinos,  781,  D ;  doloy  ut  asini  solent  sarcinas  impostas  {sus- 
cipere)^  where  there  is  allusion  to  Horace,  Sat.  I.,  9;  sub  exuvio  leonis  latet 
asinus y  831,  E  ;  ab  cquo  ad  asinos ^  to  make  a  poor  move,  assume  an  inferior  po- 
sition, 666,  E,  736,  A,  764,  F  ;  ab  asino  delapsus,  of  one  who  has -wandered  from 
his  subject,  794,  D  ;  audio  velut  asitius  lyrem,  747,  B,  which  occurs  often  in  the 
Greek  form,  sufficiently  explains  itself.  The  phrase,  ab  umbra  asini,  which  oc- 
curs several  times  in  the  Colloquies  and  Epistles,  is  an  allusion  to  the  story  told  by 
Demosthenes  of  a  dispute  between  the  rider  and  driver  of  a  hired  ass  as  to  which 
had  the  right  to  rest  in  its  shadow,  and  refers,  of  course,  to  eccentric  and  trifling 
litigation. 

Among  true  proverbs  we  may  also  class  the  following  ;  a  calce  ad  carceres, 
from  the  finish  to  the  starting  point,  a  figure  taken  from  the  circus  and  referring  to 
those  who  have  to  do  a  thing  over  again,  682,  B ;  ad  lequeum  res  redit,  for  which 
we  find,  ad  restim  res  redit  (Phormio,  686),  the  noose  is  the  only  resource,  for 
those  in  desperate  circumstances,  787,  E ;  ansa  trahit  ansam,  one  thing  suggests 
another,  763,  B  ;  the  opposite  of  which  is  clavus  clavo  pellitur,  one  idea  dis- 
places another,  847,  B.  Ansa  suggests  another  proverbial  allusion  implied  in, 
ansa  tantum  arripis  ilium  qua  teneri  non  potest,  which  means  to  seize  the  wrong 
horn  of  a  dilemma,  706,  F.  The  meaning  of,  ante  victoriam  canere  triumphum, 
which  we  express  more  simply  by  *'  counting  chickens  before  they  are  hatched,'' 
646,  E,  and  of,  artetn  quaevis  terra  alit,  of  Greek  origin,  758,  B,  is  evident. 
Bovem  adducere  ad  ceroma,  418,  C,  851,  B,  which  suggests  our  **  bull  in  a  china 
shop,"  is  a  classical  proverb,  also  is  referred  to  by  Gregory  of  Tours,  praef.  Con- 
fessors ;  videtur  ut  bos  piger  palaestrae  ludum  exerceat.  Canis  caninam  non  esty 
740,  A,  is  not  given  in  the  Chiliades,  but  finds  its  counterpart  again  in  one 
of  the  many  proverbs  in  Gregory,  this  time  put  into  the  mouth  of  the  Frankish 
monarch,  corvus  ocuhim  corvi  non  eruit,  H.  F.  5,  18.  Crows  are  referred  to,  how- 
ever, in  the  classical  proverb,  conicum  oculos  configere,  491,  C,  to  deceive  the  sharp 
sighted,  something  like  our  "to  throw  dust  into  one's  eyes."  The  sharp  sight 
of  the  lynx  is  alluded  to  as  proverbial  sometimes,  463,  A,  465,  B.  Clavam  ex- 
torquere  e  manu  Herculis,  is  a  classical  proverb  suggesting  a  difficult  undertak- 
ing, 645,  D.  Corycaeis  plena  sunt  omnia,  640,  B,  where  we  should  say,  "The 
very  walls  have  ears,"  refers  to  the  spies  at  Coryci,  who  informed  the  pirates  of  the 
movements  of  the  trading  vessels.  Cretensem  agere  cum  Cretense,  756,  E,  and, 
Cretensis  incidit  itt  Cretensem,  831,  B,  to  play  the  rogue  with  the  rogue  and  to 
meet  one's  match  at  roguery,  refer  to  the  ill  repute  of  the  Cretians  for  honesty,  in 
which  they  were  associated  with  the  Cappadocians  and  Cilicians  as  the  rpia  KaTzira 
KaKiara  of  antiquity.    Difficile  canem  vetulum  loris  assuescere,  662,  B,  hardly  needs 


Io6  MEDIEVAL    AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

comment,  nor  does  simul  sorbere  et  flare  difficile  est,  643,  D,  and  760,  D,  which 
comes  from  Plautus.     Digmim  patella  operculum,  662,  B,  was  a  rustic  proverb  in 
the  days  of  Jerome,  and  probably  suggests,  nacta  est  suuni  patella  operculum,  741, 
B.     Dimidium  facti  qui  bene  coepit  habet,  754,  A,  does  not  appear  to  be  classical, 
and  of  course  is  only  the  Latin  for  our  "Well  begun  is  half  done."     Two  pro- 
verbs of  about  the  same  purport,   something  like  the  western,   "You  don't  get 
wheat  from  cockle,"   are,  e  columbis  nan  nascuntur  milvii,  696,  F,  and  e  malis 
^orvis  nascuntur  mala  ova,  829,  E,  suggesting,  colubra  restem  non  parit,  in  Pe- 
tronius,   45.     Do7iec  spiral  homo  sperandum  est,  728,  D,   is  equivalent  to  our 
*  While  there's  life  there's  hope."    A  melancholy  man  is  ex  antro  Trophonii,  810, 
A,  826,  E,  or  e  specu  Trophonii,  405,  C.     Habea^it  similes  labra  lactucae,  an- 
other reference  to  the  ass,  ab  asino  carduos  pascente,  refers  to  cases  of  what  we 
sometimes  callpoetic  justice,  448,  A,  643,  B,  863,  E.     Hamo  aureo  piscere,  821, 
A,  640,  F,  a  saying  of  Augustus,  reported  by  Suetonius,  which  we  also  find  in  me- 
diaeval literature  (Cf.  a  sermon  by  Absalom,  Abbot  of  Springkirschbach,  P.  L. ,  CIL, 
47,  A,  hamum  aureum  fuittunt  in  aquam  turbidatn),  means  to  risk  much  for  a  small 
return,  and  is  associated  in  the  Colloquies '9J\\h.  the  pToyerhial  gemmas  vitreo  per- 
mutare,  885,  C,  a.nd  plumbum  commutare  aureo,  641,  A.     In  fine  sera  parsimonia, 
650,  A,  846,  A,  from  Hesiod,  hardly  needs  explanation.  In  lente  unguentum,'jOT,T>, 
is  used  of  introducing  an  inappropriate  subject  into  a  conversation  :  in  planitiem 
provocare  equum,  647,  A,   is  to  compete  with  one  at  his  specialty.     /;/  mare 
quaerere  aqua?7i,  726,  D,  needs  no  comment.     Itt  utramque  dormire  aurej7i,  a 
popular  proverb  found  in  both  the  Roman  comic  writers,  to  be  at  one' s  ease  about 
a  matter,  638,  B,  824,  A.     Istaec  in  te  cudetur  faba,  826,  B,  from  Terence  (Eun., 
381),  has  not  been  satisfactorily  explained,  though  its  meaning  seems  to  be,  the 
loss  or  misfortune  be  thine.     Schneider  (o.  c. ,  4)  assimilates  it  to  <ia/cov  Ko-rziq, 
equivalent  to  ope7-am  ludis  (Zenob,,  6,  48).     Lampadem  tradere,  673,  C,  to  turn 
a  piece  of  business  over  to  another,  was  suggested  by  the  torch  races  at  the  Pro- 
methean games,  and  probably  explains  the  origin  of  a  familiar  seal.     The  words 
themselves  are  found  in  one  of  the  finest  lines  of  Lucretius   (II.,  79) >  ^^  quasi 
cursores  vitai  laTUpada  tradunt,     De  lana  caprina,  403,  461,  C,  goats'  wool,  is  a 
little  like  lacte  gallinaceum,  in  the  thirty-seventh  chapter  of  Petronius,  and  means, 
of  coiu-se,  in  the  relation  in  which  it  is  used  by  Horace  and  Erasmus,  nothing  at 
all.     Laterem  lavat,  found  in  Phormio,  186,  and  in  the  eleventh  satire  of  Luci- 
lius,  is  an  expressive  way  of  saying  that  one  is  throwing  away  his  pains.     Magis 
quadrent  clitellae  bovi,  746,  B,  like  a  pack  saddle  on  an  ox,  is  classical  and  its 
application  obvious.     Magnum  vectigal parsi??ioJiiaest,  646,  D,  846,  D,  is  equally 
clear.     Mutuum  muli  scabunt,  450,  C,  suggests  the  manus  manuf?i  lavat  of  Pe- 
tronius, 46,  but  its  meaning  is  more  akin  ioserva  me,  sej^oabo  te,  id.,  44.     Ne  irre- 
tentur  crabones,  875,  B,  474,  B,  of  Greek  origin  and  found  in  the  Amphitrion  of 
Plautus,  suggests  our  colloquial,  "  Don't  stir  up  the  animals,"  which  is  its  equiva- 
lent in  English.     Nemo  omnibus  horis  sapit,  440,  D,  is  classical ;   ne  quid  nimis, 
646,  F,   et  passim,  is  from  Terence;  while  nectere  e  stipulis  fabarum,  81 1,  D, 
on   the  other  hand,  is  a  Dutch    proverb    for  making    anything    from  poor  ma- 
terials, which  finds  its  classical  parallel  in  non  e  quovis  ligno  Mercurius  fingitur, 
754,   B.     Non  7nagis  parcere   qua77i    lupus,   875,   B,  is   a  conventional  expres- 
sion to-day;  non  vident  manticam  in  tergope7identei7i,  420,  B,  we  don't  see  ourselves 


LATIN    OF    THE    RENAISSANCE.  I07 

as  others  see  us,  occurs  in  Catullus,  Phaedrus  and  Perseus  ;  non  omnibtcs  dormio^ 
844,  E,  refers  to  a  racy  anecdote  told  of  Maecenas  and  his  host  Galba  by  Plutarch  ; 
its  approximate  equivalent  is  our  **  sleeping  with  one  eye  open."  Novus  rex,  nova 
lex,  759,  E,  is  mentioned  as  a  vulgo  iadatum,  non  tarn  vanum  quant  parum  Lati- 
mim prov erbium.  Nuces  relinquere,  653,  F,  to  leave  childish  things,  is  very  famil- 
iar, and  Horace's  equitare  in  arundine  longa,  403,  is  used  of  unbending  to  child- 
ish sports.  Non  ignis  absque  fumo^  859,  A,  needs  no  special  remark  ;  oleum  addere 
camino,  856,  D,  to  add  fuel  to  the  flame,  has  an  almost  antithetical  equivalent* 
frigidam  suffundere,  633,  D,  from  the  water  thrown  on  the  smithy  fire  to  increase 
the  heat.  Odi  puerlum  praecoci  sapientia,  414,  A,  is  a  quotation  from  Horace 
given  as  a  proverb  in  the  Adages.  Peril  oleum  et  opera,  639,  D,  from  the  Poenulus 
of  Plautus,  I,  2,  122,  and  sors  et  usura  peril,  taken  from  the  wrestling  school  and 
commercial  life  respectively,  have  the  same  meaning.  Phirimum  referl  quid  in- 
fundas  ruditestulae,  696,  F,  is  an  allusion  to  a  quotation  from  Horace's  epistles  ( I, 
2,  69),  that  is  given  in  full  in  another  place,  768,  E,  and  is  also  used  as  a  proverb 
by  Muretus.  Pro  thesauro  carbones,  698,  B,  763,  A,  is  a  proverb  found  in  Phae- 
drus, 5,  6.  Qui  pessime  canit  primus  incipiet,  is  also  mentioned  as  a  vulgo  iac- 
tattim  proverbium,  721,  E.  Erasmus  is  indebted  to  the  Phormio  of  Terence  again 
for  qiiot  homines  tol  senlenliae,  842,  E,  et  passim.  Plus  vident  oculi  quam  oculus, 
824,  B,  is  a  little  like  our  *'  Two  heads  are  better  than  one."  Rem  acu  tangere, 
642,  C,  661,  D,  et  passim  from  Plautus,  Rudens,  1306,  is  possibly  a  reference  to 
the  surgeon's  needle  (Cf.  Apuleius,  Met.  8),  and  in  Erasmus  is  about  equi- 
valent to  our  *'  Hit  the  nail  on  the  head."  Revulsit  pdlos  caudae  equinae, 
743,  E,  is  an  allusion  to  the  well-known  legend  of  Sertorius,  which  is  referred 
to  indirectly  by  Horace,  Ep.  2,  i,  45.  Sat  cito  si  sat  bene,  654,  D,  needs  no 
comment.  Satius  est  cessare  quam  nihil  agere,  724,  E,  and  praestat  otiosum  esse 
quam  nihil  agere,  636,  E,  from  the  first  epistle  of  Pliny,  is  intended  to  express  the 
fact  that  it  is  better  to  do  nothing  than  to  waste  one' s  time  over  trifles.  A  Greek 
proverb,  which  Erasmus  cites,  however,  from  Aulus  Gellius,  is,  Saepe  etiam 
est  olitor  valde  opportuna  locutus,  809,  F.  Another  proverb  of  Greek  origin, 
quoted  once  in  that  language,  407,  D,  is,  Simla  semper  simia  etiam  purpura 
vestita,  418)  D.  Sero  sapiunt  Phryges,  885,  E,  the  force  of  which  is  clear 
enough,  is  a  classical  proverb,  naturally,  but  of  uncertain  derivation.  It  may 
refer  to  the  tardy  desire  of  the  Trojans  to  restore  Helen  to  the  Greeks,  as 
Festus  explains  it,  or  it  may  be  an  allusion  to  the  tragedy  mentioned  by 
Cicero,  Ad  Fam.,  7,  16;  In  Equo  Triano  scis  esse  in  extremo ;  sero 
sapiunt ;  or  it  is  not  impossible  that  the  two  theories  as  to  its  origin  can  be 
reconciled  to  each  other.  Sei-vus  prae  servo  est,  853,  C,  there  is  no  dead  level, 
even  among  slaves,  is  of  Homeric  origin,  and  Sparta??i  quae  contingit  orno,  738, 
B,  is  from  Euripides.  Tyria  maria  concitare,  801,  F,  to  occasion  a  great  disturb- 
ance of  any  sort,  seems  to  refer  to  the  time  when  Carthage  forbade  the  navigation 
of  the  Tyrian  sea  to  other  nations.  In  ipso  portu  impegi,  724,  D,  to  suffer  ship- 
wreck at  the  outset  of  an  undertaking,  is  from  St.  Jerome,  a  parallel  to  the  in 
limine  offendere  of  Vergil.  Vulpus  anus  non  capitur  laqueo,  693,  F,  813,  A,  is 
ancient  testimony  to  Reynard's  cunning,  which  is  supported  by  the  allusion  con- 
tained in  vulpina  prudentia,  ^g"],  B.  Durum  est  ielu?n  necessitas,  712,  E,  755, 
A,  807,  A,  is  perhaps  Erasman,  as  is  also  doubtless  the  sententious  expression  of 
a  common  sentiment  in,  ubicumqtie  pura  mens  est,  ibi  Deus  est,  824. 


Io8  MEDI/EVAL    AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

Very  similar  to  true  proverbs  are  various  colloquial  expressions  of  a  proverbial 
character, — proverbs  worn  down  to  idioms,  we  might  call  them.  Some  of  these 
are  hardly  to  be  distinguished  from  those  just  mentioned  ;  others  have  lost  their 
figurative  force  almost  entirely  and  have  become  mere  turns  of  speech.  As  a  rule 
but  a  single  citation  is  given,  though  the  expressions  often  occur  passim  through- 
out both  the  Colloquies  and  the  Encomium.  Ab  ipso  statim  lacte,  696,  Y  \  a  te- 
neris  unguiculis^  695,  C ;  abeant  or  abigere  in  malum,  rem  or  crucem,  750,  E  ; 
ab  err  are  ox  abesse  d  scopo,  639,  C;  attigere  scopum,  661,  D  ;  actum  agere,  8 1 8, 
C;  agere  fabulam,  749,  D;  ad  unguem,'j 21,  E;  albis  quadrigis,  i.  e.,  quickly, 
suggests  quadrigae  meae  decucurrerunt,  Petronius  (64),  452,  A;  albo  corvo 
rarior,  705,  C ;  adainanto  durior,  693,  D  ;  aere  Dodonaeo  loquacius,  461,  C  ; 
arrodere  ungue7n,  648,  D  ;  aures  arrigere,  664,  A.;  bonis  avibus,  bona  verba^ 
boni  consulite,  passim  ;  cadit  alea,  638,  C  ;  camelum  salianlem,  675,  B  ;  cicadem 
ala  correptam,  81 1,  C  ;  claudere  latus,  658,  C  ;  Coroebo  stultior^  82I,  B  ;  corvos 
hiantes,  763,  D  ;  larum  hiantem,  758,  C,  and  lupus  kians,  641,  A  ;  curare  cu- 
tem  or  cuticulam,  631,  B  ;  dama  fugacior,  64I,  E;  de  plaustro  loqui,  733,  D; 
Jiculnum  praesidium^  642,  E  ;  ficumficum,  scapham  scapham  dicere^  712,  A.;  folia 
Sybillae,  656,  B  ;  gemma  bibere^  662,  A  ;  lapidi  dicere,  719,  A,  pisci  dicere,  797, 
C,  and  surdo  canere,  Tj$,  B  ;  Luculli  divitae,  661,  C  ;  lupus  in  fabula,  636,  F, 
and  quasi  conspecto  lupo,  423,  A,  refers  to  the  superstition  that  a  man  lost  his  voice 
if  seen  by  a  wolf  before  he  saw  it.  Indulgere  genio,  659,  F  ;  ne  musca  quidem^ 
646,  D  ;  ne  mica  quidem,  754,  B  (the  former  is  the  more  common  in  Erasmus); 
nihil  habere  dentis,  820,  A;  nihil  esse  nasi,  755,  B,  and  naris  obesae,  403  ;  om- 
nium horarum  homo,  654,  A  ;  Orbilio  plagiosior,  654,  B  ;  os  laedere,  734,  B  ;  os 
oblinere,  774,  E  ;  ovum  ab  ovo,  647,  B  ;  omnis  lapds  movendus,  837,  D  \  par  pari 
referre,  646,  D  ;  perfricare  faciem,  480,  F ;  perfricare  frontem,  645,  E ,  expor- 
rigere  fronte?n,  405,  C  ;  Persarum  gaza,  846,  B  ;  pleniis  tibiis,  8l2,  C  ;  plusquam 
animam  debere,  695 ,  A ;  prora  et  piippis,  640,  B  ;  rore  vivere,  660,  B  ;  Siculae 
gerrae,  639,  C  ;  tria  verba,  696,  F  ;  spe  lactate,  659,  D. 

Erasmus  was  the  last  person  to  write  in  Latin  works  that  were  both  popular 
and  influential.  Neither  he  nor  any  of  his  predecessors  or  contemporaries  ever 
quite  attained  the  classical  grace  and  correctness  of  Muretus'  scholarly  discourses. 
The  ponderous  learning  of  Grotius  and  the  wisdom  of  Bacon  was  still  to  find  in 
Latin  its  medium  of  expression.  Barclay  was  to  use  it  for  the  novel,  and  innu- 
merable pedagogues  were  yet  to  imitate  Plautus  and  Terence  in  school  festival 
plays.  This  Latin  that  followed  was  formally  correct,  the  Latin  of  the  age  of 
lexicons  and  systematic  grammars  and  stylistic  compendia.  But  with  Luther's 
Bible  and  the  vernacular  literature  that  arose  with  it  the  life  had  gone  out  of  Latin. 
The  constituency  of  the  people  was  superseding  that  of  the  schools,  and  its  liter- 
ature was  assuming  first  rank.  Hereafter  he  who  wrote  with  the  artistic  impulse 
and  the  fervor  of  inspiration  was  to  commit  his  thoughts  to  the  tongue  of  his 
country.  The  ideal  of  Latin  had  changed.  It  was  no  longer  the  language  of  the 
future.     It  had  become  the  tongue  of  the  past.* 

Erasmus'  attack  on  the  Ciceronians  was  really  an  offensive  campaign  against 

*  Rten  me  semble  tnort  cotnnie  le  ciceronianisnie  de  la  Renaissance  du  seizieme  Steele 
Rien  n'est  vivant  en  revanche  comme  le  balbutiement  de  l' humattesme  naissant.  Cochin, 
o.  c,  35  and  36. 


LATIN    OF    THE    RENAISSANCE.  IO9 

this  very  tendency  to  make  Latin  exclusively  a  language  of  the  schools.  He 
who  wrote  a  book  **  standing  on  one  foot,"  as  he  says,  had  little  patience  for  the 
artificial  niceties  of  the  purists.  He  appreciated  the  fact  that  Latin  must  main- 
tain vernacular  characteristics,  must  grow  and  adapt  itself  to  the  needs  of  the 
time,  if  it  was  to  retain  its  supremacy  as  the  literary  language.  We  already  have 
sufficient  evidence  of  the  fact  that  he  adopted  this  principle  in  practice,  and,  un- 
consciously perhaps,  formed  his  idioms  after  the  fashion  of  the  popular  speech  of 
his  own  time  and  of  antiquity.  There  is  something  analogous  in  the  last  trans- 
formation of  living  Latin  to  what  we  see  in  case  of  the  late  Silurian  fossils,  where 
shells  become  distorted  in  a  thousand  ways  in  the  effort  of  the  occupant  to  adapt 
himself  to  changing  conditions  before  the  order  becomes  extinct.  After  Eras- 
mus' time  Latin  loses  its  quality  of  originality.  It  becomes  a  copy  ;  and  the 
most  we  can  expect  of  those  who  employ  it  for  literary  purposes  is  that  now  and 
then  a  writer  may  do  for  a  Roman  author  what  Hilda,  in  Marble  Faun,  did  for  the 
old  masters  of  painting,  catch  something  of  the  spirit  as  well  as  the  form  of  the 
works  he  imitates. 


xjKivERsrrr 

^CALIFO^ 


BIBLIOGRAPHY. 


[In  cases  where  more  than  one  work  of  an  author  has  been  consulted  the 
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Benedicti,  Regula  Monachorum,  ed  Wollflein,                               Lips.  1895. 

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Kaulen,  Handbuch  der  Vulgata  [H.  V.],                                      Mainz,  1870. 
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Alberti  Stadensis,  Troilus,  ed.  Merzdorf,  Lips.  1875. 

Bacon,  Opus  Magnum,  ed.  Jebb,  Lon.  1733- 

Baedae,  Historia  Ecclesiastica  Gentis  Anglorum,  ed.  Holder,  Freiburg  und 

Tubingen,  1882. 
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Comparetti,  Vergilio  nel  Medio  Evo,  Livomo,  1872  (Trans.  Benecke), 

London,  1 895. 
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Paris,  1843. 

du  M6ril,  Poesies  Populaires  Latines  du  Moyen  Age  [P.  P.  M.  A.], 

Paris,  1847. 

du  Meril,  Poesies  Inedites  du  Moyen  Age  [P.  I.  M.  A.],  Paris,  1854. 


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Lips.  1889. 

Feugueray,  Doctrines  Politiques  de  St.  Thomas  d'Aquin,           Paris,  1857. 

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Gadfredus  Monumentensis,  Historia  Britonum,  ed.  Giles,            London,  1844. 

Gebhart,  Les  Origines  de  la  Renaissance  en  Italie,                       Paris,  1879. 
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Berlin,  1845. 

Gildas,  de  Excidio  Brittanniae,  ed.  Stevenson,                             London,  1838. 
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Gottingen,  1838. 

Habatsch,  Die  Lateinischen  Vagantenlieder  des  Mittelalters,       Gorlitz,  1870. 

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Kaulich,  Geschichte  der  Scholastischen  Philosophic,                    Prague,  1863. 
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Lips.  1884. 

Mapes,  Latin  Poems,  ed.  Wright  [L.  P.],                                      London,  1841. 

Mapes,  Nuga  Curialium,  ed.  Wright  [N.  C.],                               London,  1850. 

Moller,  Johannes  Scotus  Erigena,  Mainz,                                        Mainz,  1844. 

Monumenta  Historica  Britannica,  Vol.  I,  [M.  H.  B.],                 London,  1848. 
Monumenta  Germaniae  Historica,  ed.  Pertz  [M.  G.  H.],            Hannover. 

Scriptores  [M.  G.  H.  s.]. 

Scriptores  Antiquissimi  [M.  G.  H.  s.  a.]. 

Scriptores  Rerum  Merovingicarum  [M.  G.  H.  s.  r.  m.]. 

Poetae  Medii  Aevi  [M.  G.  H.  p.  m.  a.]. 
Muratori,  Scriptores  [M.  S.], 

Muratori,  Antiquitates  Italicae  [M.  A.  I.],                                     Arretii,  1775- 

Notices  des  Manuscrits  de  la  Bibliotheque  Nationale  [N.  d.  M.],  Paris,  1880. 

Patrilogia  Latina,  Tom.  I.-CXXXIV.  [P.  L.],                             Paris,  18—. 

Recueil  des  Historiens  des  Gaules  et  de  la  France  [Rec],          Paris,  1862. 

Renan,  Averro^s  et  I'Averroeisme,                                                    Paris,  1866. 

Ronca,  Cultura  Medioevale  e  Poesia  Latina  d' Italia  nei  XI  e  XII  Secoli,  Roma, 

1892. 
Schiitz,  Thomas — Lexicon,  Paderbom,   1895. 

Suger,  Oeuvres  Completes  (pub.  de  la  societe  de  I'hist.  de  France), 

Paris,  1867. 

Theofridus,  Vita  Willibrordi,  ed.  Rossberg,                                    Lips.  1883. 

Tiraboschi,  Storia  della  Litteratura  Italiana,                                    Milano,  1823. 
Thurot,  Notices  et  extraits  de  divers  manuscrits  latins  pour  servir  §1  I'histoire  des 

doctrines  grammaticales  au  moyen  age,                                      Paris,  1868. 

Vitae  Sanctorum,  Metricae,  ed.  Harster,                                         Lips.  1887. 
West,  Alcuin  and  the  Rise  of  the  Christian  Schools,                     New  York,  1892. 

III.   Dante  and  Petrarch. 

Baumker,  Quibus  antiquis  auctoribus  Petrarca  in  conscribendis  rermn  memoran- 

danun  libris  usus  sit,                                                                      Miinster,  1882. 


112  MEDIEVAL    AND    RENAISSANCE    LATINITY. 

/ 
Baldelli  Boni,  Del  Petrarca  e  delle  sue  Opere,  Firenze,        1797. 

Celsus,  Commentarii  de  Vita  Caesaris,  ed,  Achaintre  et  Lemaire,  Paris,  1820, 

Dante,  La  Divina  Commedia,  Paris,  1875. 

Dante,  Opere  Latine,  ed.  Giuliani,  Firenze,        1882. 

Hettner,  Petrarca  und  Boccacio,  Deutsche  Rundschau,  II,  228. 
Korting,  Geschichte  der  Litteratur  Italiens,  Lips.  1878. 

Macri-Leone,  La  Bucolica  Latina  nella  Litteratura  Italiana  del  Secclo  XIV, 

r 

Mezidres,  Petrarque,  Etude  d'apr^s  de  Nouveaux  Documents, 

Moore,  Dante  and  his  Early  Biographers, 

Muretus,  Scripta  Selecta,  ed.  Frey, 

Nelli,  Lettres  a  Petrarque,  ed.  Cochin, 

Nolhac,  Petrarque  et  Thumanisme  en  Italie, 

Petrarcha,  Opera  Latina, 

Petrarca,  De  Contemptu  Mundi ;  de  Remediis  utriusque  Fortunae,  Roterodami, 

Petrarca,  De  Viris  Illustribus  Vitae, 

Petrarca,  Epistulae  de  Rebus  Familiaribus,  ed.  Fracassati, 

Petrarca,  Poemata  Minora, 

Petrarca,  Rime, 

Poggio,  Epistulae,  ed.  Tonellis, 

Philelphus,  Vita  Dantis  Aligerii, 

Voigt,  Die  Wiederbelebung  des  Classischen  Alterthums, 

Zingerle,  Petrarcha' s  Verhaltness  zu  den  romischen  Dichtern, 

Zumbini,  Studi  sul  Petrarca 

IV.    Erasmus, 

Amiel,  Un  Libre-penseur  du  XVIme  Si^cle,  Paris,  1889. 

Butler,  Life  of  Erasmus,  with  a  general  survey  of  literature  from  the  tenth  to  the 

fifteenth  centuries,  London,        1825. 

Drummund,  Life  and  Character  of  Erasmus,  London,        1873. 

Dur^nd  du  Lauer,  Erasme,  precurseur  et  initiateur  de  1'  esprit  moderne, 

Paris,  1872. 

Erasmus,  Opera  Omnia,  Lugduni,      1703. 

Erasmus,  Colloquia  et  Encomium  Moriae,  ed.  Rabus,  Norimburgae,  1774. 

Feug^re,  Erasme,  Paris,  1874. 

Froude,  Life  and  Letters  of  Erasmus,  *  New  York,  1894. 

Hess,  Erasmus  von  Rotterdam,  Zurich,  1790. 

Levesque  de  Burigny,  Histoire  de  la  vie  et  des  ouvrages  d' Erasme, 

Paris,  1757. 

Muller,  Leben  des  Erasmus  von  Rotterdam,  Hamburg,     1828. 

Nisard,  Erasme,  Paris,  1877. 

Richter,  Erasmus-Studien,  Dresden,       189 1. 

Schneider,  de  Proverbiis  Plautinis  Terentanisque,  Berlin,  1878. 

Schonfeld,  Die  Beziehung,  der  Satire  Rabelais'  zu  Erasmus'   Encomium  Moriae 

und  Colloquia,  Mod.  Lang.  Ass'n.  of  Am.  Pub.,  Vol.  8,       Baltimore,     1893. 
Stichart,   Erasmus  von    Rotterdam,  seine  Stellung  zu  der  Kirche  und  zu  den 

Kirchlichen  Bewegungen  seiner  Zeit,  Lips.  1870. 


Torino, 

1889. 

Paris, 

1868. 

London, 

1890. 

Lips. 

1887. 

Paris, 

1892. 

Paris. 

Venetiis, 

1501. 

anae,  Roterodami, 

1649. 

Bologna, 

1874. 

Firenze, 

1859. 

Milano, 

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Firenze, 

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Firenze, 

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Florentia, 

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Berlin, 

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Innsbruck, 

1871. 

Firenze, 

1895. 

BIBLIOGRAPHY. 


113 


Addenda. 

Gesta  Romanorum,  ed.  Oesterley,  Berlin,          1872. 

Epistulae  Obscuronim  Virorum,  Unrichi  Huttoni  opera,  Supplementum,  Vol.  i, 

ed.  Bocking,  Lips.              1868. 

Federigo  secundo,  Torino, 

Draeger,  Historische  Syntax  der  lateinischen  Sprache,  Lips.              1878. 


■OF   THX 

CTNIVERSITT 


Pf^- 


CALIFQlV 


Hl^ 


VITA. 

Rei  publicae  Neo  Eboracensis  oppidulo  quod  Anglice  Portageville  vocatur 
anno  Domini  MDCCCLXVIII  natus,  primis  rudimentis  studiorum  et  in  ludis 
publicis  et  apud  magistros  privatos  exactis,  anno  aetatis  decimo  octavo  Univer- 
sitatem  Minnesotensem  intravi  unde  post  quattuor  annis  gradum  baccalaureum  tuli. 
Deinde  ludis  publicis  Minnesotae  magistri  munere  functus  sum.  Tertio  post  ac- 
ceptum  baccaleaureatvun  anno  socius  honoris  causa  Universitatis  Chicagoniensis 
factus,  apud  vmiversitatem  Gottinganensium  itemque  Bernensium  Helvetiorum 
studens  iuris  versatus,  Italia,  Gallia,  Anglia  peregrinatus,  anno  iam  desinente 
ad  patriam  reversus  sum.  Itemm  ludipraeceptor  vel  ludorum  administrator  apud 
Minnesotenses  fui  usque  ad  annum  Domini  MDCCCXCVII,  quo  tempore  inter 
socios  insignis  Universitatis  Columbiae  acceptus  ad  disciplinas  humaniores  quarum 
semper  studiosus  eram  quaeque  ad  doctoratus  honorem  spectabant  me  contuli. 
Gradu  tamen  nondum  accepto  ad  Portum  Divitem  nuper  victara  vocatus,  im- 
peratoribus  Henry  et  Davis,  praeses  Concilii  Scholastici  Superioris  ludis  publicis 
insulae  praefui.  Unde  regressus  tandem  doctoris  honorem  quem  ad  adispicendum 
haec  dissertatio  scripta  est  consecutus  sum. 

Inter  professores  quibus  praecipue  mihi  agendae  sunt  gratiae  habendi  svmt 
Judson  Chicagoniensis,  von  Ihering  Gottinganensis,  quem  e  doctissimis  iuris  con- 
sultorum  mors  magno  mei  qui  inter  discipulos  eius  eram  dolore  eripuit  imprimis 
tamen  Peck  et  Egbert  Columbiae,  quorum  unus  dux  et  rector  studiorum  omnium 
raeorum  fuit,  alter  arcana  antiquitatis  per  monumenta  mihi  aperuit,  necnon  et 
Munroe  Smith  qui  me  ius  civile  docuit. 


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